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Form  L9-25m-8,'46 (9852)444 


A  PERPLEXED  PHILOSOPHER 


WORKS  BY  HENRY  GEORGE. 


A  Perplexed  Philosopher. 

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Progress  and  Poverty. 

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Property  in  Land.     A  Controversy  with  the 
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A  PERPLEXED 

PHILOSOPHER 


BEING 

AN  EXAMINATION  OF  MR.  HERBERT  SPENCER'S  VARIOUS  UTTER- 
ANCES ON  THE  LAND  QUESTION.  WITH  SOME  INCIDENTAL 
REFERENCE  TO  HIS  SYNTHETIC  PHILOSOPHY 


TATEKOBMALbUUviOL 


" RY 


HENRY  GEORGE 


Just  for  a  handful  of  silver  he  left  us. 

Just  for  a  ribbon  to  stick  in  his  coat — 
Found  the  one  gift  of  which  fortune  bereft  us, 

Lost  all  the  others  she  lets  us  devote. 
********** 
Blot  out  his  name,  then,  record  one  lost  soul  more. 

One  task  more  declined,  one  more  footpath  untrod, 
One  more  triumph  for  devils,  and  sorrow  for  angels, 

One  wrong  more  to  man,  one  more  insult  to  God ! 

Robert  Brcnvning. 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES  L.  WEBSTER  &   COMPANY 

1892 


Copyright,  1S92, 
By  henry  GEORGE. 

{All  rig/its  reserved.') 


HD 
1311 

s 


CONTENTS. 


Introduction. 
The  reason  for  this  examination > 3 


Part  I  — Declaration. 
Chapter    I  —  "  Social  Statics  "  —  The  right  to  land    .    .     . 
II  —  The  incongruous  passage 

III  —  "  Social  Statics  "  —  Tlie  right  of  property  ^ 

IV  —  Mr.  Spencer's  confusion  as  to  rights.     .\r     . 
V  —  Mr.  Spencer's  confusion  as  to  value  .    .     .    . 

VI  —  From  "  Social  Statics  "  to  "  Political  Institutions  " 


Part  II— Repudiation. 

Chapter    I  —  Letter  to  the  St.  James's  Gazette^. 73 

II  —  "  The  Man  versus  the  State  "   ^/^ 86 

III  —  Letter  to  the  Times 94 

IV  —  This  apology  examined 100 

V  —  Second  letter  to  the  Times 117 

VI  —  More  letters 125 

Part  III  —  Recant.^tion. 

Chapter   I— The  fate  of  "  Social  Statics  " 131 

II  —  The  place  of  "  Justice  "  in  the  synthetic  philosophy.     .    .     .135 

III  —  The  synthetic  philosophy 1.38 

IV  —  The  idea  of  justice  in  the  synthetic  philosophy 105 

V  —  Mr.  Spencer's  task 173 

VI  — "  The  rights  to  the  uses  of  natural  media  " 179 

VII  —  "  Justice  "  on  the  right  to  light  and  air!     ....     ...  192 

VIII  — "Justice  "  on  the  riglit  to  land  .    .V< 202 

IX  —  "Justice" — The  right  of  property .^    .    .226 

X  —  The  right  of  property  and  the  right  of  tapiation    \/\    .     .    .  243 

XI  —  Compensation .^T -'55 

XII  —  "Justice"  —  The  land  question    .^7 284 

XIII  — Principal  Brown 300 


Conclusion. 

The  moral  of  this  examination 313 

iii 


INTRODUCTION. 


THE  REASON  FOR  THIS  EXAMINATION. 


No  consecrated  absurdity  would  have  stood  its  grouiid  in  this  world  if  the 
man  had  not  silenced  the  objection  of  the  child.—  Mlehelet. 


INTRODUCTION. 

THE  REASON  FOR   THIS  EXAMTKATION", 

Although  he  stands  for  much  that  is  yet  in  dis- 
pute, there  can  be  no  question  that  at  the  present 
time  — 1892 —  Herbert  Spencer,  of  all  his  contempo- 
raries, holds  the  foremost  place  in  the  intellectual 
world,  and  through  a  wider  circle  than  any  man 
now  living,  and  j^erhaps  than  any  man  of  our  century, 
is  regarded  as  a  profound,  original  and  authoritative^ 
thinker  —  by  many  indeed  as  the  greatest  thinker  the 
world  has  ever  yet  seen. 

So  large  is  the  field  over  which  Mr.  Spencer's  writ- 
ings have  ranged,  so  many  are  the  special  branches 
of  knowledge  he  has  laid  under  contribution,  so  diffi- 
"o  cult  to  the  ordinary  mind  are  the  abstractions  in 
^  which  he  has  dealt  and  the  terminology  in  which 
\  they  are  couched,  that  this  great  reputation  is  with 
the  large  majority  of  the  intelligent  men  who  accept 
it  more  a  matter  of  faith  than  of  reason.  But  this 
rather  adds  to  than  detracts  from  the  popular  esti- 
mate ;  for  what  to  us  is  vague  often  seems  on  that 
account  the  greater,  and  what  we  have  no  means  of 
measuring,  all  the  more  profound.  Nor  does  Mr. 
Spencer's  standing  as  one  of  the  greatest,  to  many  the 
very  greatest,  of  philosophers,  lack  substantial  basis 
in  the  opinions  of  those  deemed  competent  to  gauge 
intellectual  power. 


^ 


4  rNTRODUCTION. 

John  Stuart  Mill  styled  him  "  one  of  the  acutest 
metaphysicians  of  recent  times,  one  of  the  most  vig- 
orous as  well  as  the  boldest  thinker  that  English 
speculation  has  yet  produced."  Professor  Ray  Lan- 
caster spoke  of  him  as  "  an  acute  observer  and  ex- 
perimentalist versed  in  physics  and  chemistry,  but 
above  all,  thoroughly  instructed  in  scientific  methods." 
Richard  A.  Proctor  characterized  him  as  the  "  clear- 
est of  thinkers."  G.  H.  LcM^es  said  "  it  is  question- 
able whether  any  thinker  of  finer  calibre  has  appeared 
in  our  century,"  and  that  "he  alone  of  all  British 
thinkers  has  organized  a  jjhilosophy.""  Professor 
David  Masson  deemed  him  "  the  one  of  all  our  think- 
ers who  has  founded  for  himself  the  largest  new 
scheme  of  a  systematic  philosophy."  Dr.  McCosh, 
Avho  fundamentally  differed  from  him,  said  "his  bold 
generalizations  are  always  instructive,  and  some  of 
them  may  in  the  end  be  established  as  the  profound- 
est  laws  of  the  knowable  universe."  St.  George 
Mivart,  who  as  a  Catholic  is  also  at  variance  in  impor- 
tant matters,  says  "  we  cannot  deny  the  title  of  phi- 
losopher to  such  a  thinker  as  Mr.  Spencer,  who  does 
genuinely  bind  together  different  and  hitherto  alien 
subjects,  and  that  by  a  clear  and  wide  though  neither 
an  all-comprehensive  nor  a  spiritual  hypothesis,  the 
principle  of  evolution."  Professor  Tyndall  calls 
him  "  the  apostle  of  the  understanding."  His  "  pro- 
found and  vigorous  writings  "  have  been  likened  by 
Professor  Huxley  to  "  the  embodiment  of  the  spirit 
of  Descartes  in  the  knowledge  of  our  own  day." 
Darwin  spoke  of  him  as  "our  great  philosopher," 
greeted  him  as  "  the  great  expounder  of  the  principle 
of  evolution,"  and  wrote  to    him  that   "  every  one 


THE   REASON   FOR    THIS   EXAMINATION.  5 

with  eyes  to  see  and  ears  to  hear  ought  to  bow  their 
knee  to  you."  Professor  Stanley  Jevons  ranked  his 
work  with  the  "  Principia  "  of  Newton.  John  Fiske, 
representing  unquestionably  the  opinion  of  large  num- 
bers of  intelligent  and  influential  men,  declares  it  to 
be  of  the  calibre  of  that  of  Aristotle  and  Newton,  but 
"  as  far  surpassing  their  work  in  its  vastness  of  per- 
formance as  the  railway  surpasses  the  sedan-chair  or 
as  the  telegraph  surpasses  the  carrier  pigeon."  Pres- 
ident Barnard  in  the  same  strain  said,  "  his  philoso- 
phy is  the  only  philosophy  that  satisfies  an  earnestly 
inquiring  mind,"  adding  that  "  we  have  in  Herbert 
Spencer  not  only  the  profoundest  thinker  of  our  time, 
but  the  most  capacious  and  powerful  intellect  of  all 
time.  Aristotle  and  his  master  were  not  more  beyond 
the  pygmies  who  preceded  them  than  he  is  beyond 
Aristotle.  Kant,  Hegel,  Fichte  and  Schelling  are 
gropers  in  the  dark  by  the  side  of  him." 

Such  estimates  are  not  unquestioned,  and  opinions 
of  a  different  kind  might  be  cited  from  men  of  high 
standing.  But  the  current  of  general  thought, 
swelled  by  the  wonderful  scientific  achievements  of 
our  time,  has  run  powerfully,  almost  irresistibly,  in 
favor  of  ideas  with  which  Mr.  Spencer  is  identified, 
absorbing,  intimidating  and  driving  back  opposition 
even  where  it  seemed  most  firmly  intrenched,  until  to 
question  them  has  come  largely  to  be  looked  upon  as 
evidence  not  merely  of  unscientific  beliefs,  but  of 
ignorance  and  superstition.  Whatever  may  be  the 
verdict  of  the  future,  the  man  who  is  regarded  as  the 
great  philosopher  of  evolution  has  within  his  own 
time  won  an  acceptance  and  renown  such  as  no  pre- 
ceding philosopher  ever  personally  enjoyed.     Thus, 


6  INTRODUCTION. 

these  estimates  represent  tlie  view  that  has  had  the 
largest  currency  and  produced  the  greatest  effect,  and 
that  gives  the  weight  of  high  authority  to  any  decla- 
ration of  Mr.  Spencer's  on  a  subject  that  has  engaged 
his  attention.  Such  a  declaration,  made  with  the 
utmost  deliberation,  in  his  latest,  and  as  he  and  his 
admirers  deem,  his  ripest  and  most  important  work,  I 
propose  in  what  follows  to  examine. 

I  do  not  propose  to  discuss  Mr.  Spencer's  philoso- 
phy or  review  his  writings,  except  as  embraced  in  or 
related  to  his  teachings  on  one  subject.  That,  while 
a  subject  of  the  first  practical  importance,  is  one 
where  no  special  knowledge,  no  familiarity  with  met- 
aphysical terminology,  no  wrestling  with  abstractions, 
is  needed,  and  one  where  the  validity  of  the  reasoning 
may  be  judged  for  himself  by  any  one  of  ordinary 
powers  and  acquirements. 

My  primary  object  is  to  defend  and  advance  a 
principle  in  which  I  see  the  only  possible  relief  from 
much  that  enthralls  and  degrades  and  distorts,  turning 
light  to  darkness  and  good  to  evil,  rather  than  to 
gauge  a  philosopher  or  weigh  a  philosophy.  Yet  the 
examination  I  propose  must  lead  to  a  decisive  judg- 
ment upon  both.  As  Mr.  Spencer's  treatment  of  this 
principle  began  with  his  first  book  and  ends  with  his 
last,  we  have  in  it  a  cross  section  of  his  teachings, 
traversing  the  open  plain  of  obvious  facts  and  com- 
mon perceptions,  in  which  we  who  have  no  more  than, 
ordinary  knowledge  and  powers  may  test  for  our- 
selves his  intellectual  ability,  and,  what  is  even  more 
important,  his  intellectual  honesty.  For  to  whatever 
extent  we  may  elsewhere  separate  ability  and  honesty, 
respecting  the  talent  while  distrusting  the  man,  such 


THE   REASON    FOll   THIS    EXAIMINATION.  7 

separation  cannot  be  made  in  the  field  of  philosophy. 
Since  philosophy  is  the  search  for  truth,  the  philoso- 
pher who  in  his  teachings  is  swerved  by  favor  or  by 
fear  forfeits  all  esteem  as  a  philosopher. 

Nor  is  the  connection  between  the  practical  prob- 
lems that  are  forcing  themselves  on  our  civilization 
and  the  deepest  questions  with  which  speculative 
philosophy  deals,  merely  personal  or  accidental.  It 
belongs  to  the  nature  of  the  human  mind,  to  our  rela- 
tions to  the  tuiiverse  in  which  we  awake  to  conscious- 
ness. And  just  as  in  "Progress  and  Poverty"  the 
connection  that  developed  as  I  went  along  carried  me 
from  an  inquiry  into  economic  phenomena  to  consid- 
erations that  traversed  Mr.  Spencer's  theory  of  social 
evolution  and  raised  such  supreme  questions  as  the 
existence  of  God  and  the  immortality  of  man,  so  now 
I  find  a  similar  connection  asserting  itself  between 
Mr.  Spencer's  utterances  on  the  most  important  of 
social  questions  and  the  views  on  wider  and  deeper 
subjects  that  have  given  him  such  a  great  reputation. 

It  is  this  —  that  a  question  of  the  utmost  practical 
importance  thus  leads  to  questions  beside  which  in  our 
deeper  moments  the  practical  sinks  into  insignifi- 
cance ;  that  the  philosopher  whose  authority  is  now 
invoked  to  deny  to  the  masses  any  right  to  the 
physical  basis  of  life  in  this  world  is  also  the  phi- 
losopher whose  authority  darkens  to  many  all  hope  of 
life  hereafter — that  has  made  it  seem  to  me  worth 
while  to  enter  into  an  examination  which  in  its  form 
must  be  personal,  and  that  will  lead  me  to  treat  at 
greater  length  than  I  would  otherwise  be  inclined  to 
those  utterances  of  Mr.  Spencer  which  I  propose  to 
discuss. 


8  INTRODFCTION. 

I  shall  not  ask  the  reader  to  accept  anj^thing  from 
me.  All  I  ask  of  him  is  to  judge  for  himself  Mr. 
Spencer's  own  public  declarations.  The  respect  for 
authority,  the  presumption  in  favor  of  those  who 
have  won  intellectual  reputation,  is  within  reason- 
able limits,  both  prudent  and  becoming.  But  it 
should  not  be  carried  too  far,  and  there  are  some 
things  especially  as  to  which  it  behooves  us  all  to  use 
our  own  judgment  and  to  maintain  free  minds.  For 
not  only  does  the  history  of  the  world  show  that 
undue  deference  to  authority  has  been  the  potent 
agency  through  which  errors  have  been  enthroned  and 
superstitions  perpetuated,  but  there  are  regions  of 
thouglit  in  which  the  largest  powers  and  the  greatest 
acquirements  cannot  guard  against  aberrations  or  as- 
sure deeper  insight.  One  may  stand  on  a  box  and 
look  over  the  heads  of  his  fellows,  but  he  no  better 
sees  the  stars.  The  telescope  and  the  microscope  re- 
veal depths  which  to  the  unassisted  vision  are  closed. 
Yet  not  merely  do  they  bring  us  no  nearer  to  the 
cause  of  suns  and  animalcula,  but  in  looking  through 
them  the  observer  must  shut  his  eyes  to  what  lies 
about  him.  That  intension  is  at  the  expense  of  ex- 
tension is  seen  in  the  mental  as  in  the  physical 
sphere.  A  man  of  special  learning  may  be  a  fool  as 
to  common  relations.  And  that  he  who  passes  for 
an  intellectual  prince  may  be  a  moral  pauper  there 
are  examples  enough  to  show. 

As  we  must  go  to  the  shoemaker  if  we  would  be 
well  shod  and  to  the  tailor  if  we  would  be  well  clad, 
so  as  to  special  branches  of  knowledge  must  we  rel}^ 
on  those  who  have  studied  them.  But  while  yield- 
ing to  reputation  the  presumption  in  its  favor,  and 


THE  REASON   FOR   THIS   EXAMINATION.  9 

to  authority  the  respect  that  is  its  due,  let  us  not  too 
much  underrate  our  own  powers  in  what  is  concerned 
with  common  facts  and  general  relations.  While  we 
may  not  be  scientists  or  philosophers,  we  too  are  men. 
Let  us  remember  that  there  is  no  religious  supersti- 
tion that  has  not  been  taught  by  professed  teachers 
of  religious  truth ;  that  there  is  no  vulgar  economic 
fallacy  that  may  not  be  found  in  the  writings  of  pro- 
fessors ;  no  social  vagary  current  among  "  the  igno- 
rant "  whose  roots  may  not  be  discovered  among  "  the 
educated  and  cultured."  The  power  to  reason  cor- 
rectly on  general  subjects  is  not  to  be  learned  in 
schools,  nor  does  it  come  with  special  knowledge.  It 
results  from  care  in  separating,  from  caution  in  com- 
bining, from  the  habit  of  asking  ourselves  the  mean- 
ing of  the  words  we  u^e  and  making  sure  of  one  step 
before  building  another  on  it  —  and  above  all,  from 
loyalty  to  truth. 

Giving  to  Mr.  Spencer,  therefore,  the  presumption 
that  is  due  to  his  great  reputation,  but  at  the  same 
time  using  his  own  reason,  let  the  reader  consider  the 
matter  I  shall  lay  before  him. 

Herbert  Spencer's  last  volume,  "  Justice,"  contains 
his  latest  word  on  the  land  question  —  the  question 
in  which,  as  I  believe,  lies  the  only  solution  of  all 
the  vexed  and  threatening  social  and  political  prol> 
lems  of  our  time.  Accompanied,  as  it  has  been,  by 
the  withdrawal  of  earlier  utterances,  it  places  him 
definitely  on  the  side  of  those  who  contend  that  tlie 
treatment  of  land  as  private  property  cannot  equi- 
tably be  interfered  with,  a  position  the  reverse  of  that 
he  once  ably  asserted. 


10  INTRODUCTION. 

While  the  opinions  of  a  man  of  such  wide  reputa- 
tion and  large  influence,  on  a  question  already  pass- 
ing into  the  domain  of  practical  politics  and  soon  to 
become  the  burning  question  of  the  time,  are  most 
■worthy  of  attention,  they  derive  additional  importance 
from  the  fact  of  this  change.  For  a  change  from  a 
clearly  reasoned  opinion  to  its  opposite  carries  the 
implication  of  fair  and  full  consideration.  And  if 
the  reasons  for  such  a  change  be  sufficient  and  there 
be  no  suspicion  of  ulterior  motive,  the  fact  that  a  man 
now  condemns  opinions  he  once  held  adds  to  the  ad- 
miration that  previously  we  may  have  entertained  for 
him  the  additional  admiration  we  must  feel  for  one 
who  has  shown  that  he  would  rather  be  right  than 
be  consistent. 

What  gives  additional  interest  to  the  matter  is  that 
Mr.  Spencer  makes  no  change  in  his  premises,  but 
only  in  his  conclusion,  and  now,  in  sustaining  private 
property  in  land,  asserts  the  same  principle  of  equal 
liberty  from  which  he  originally  deduced  its  con- 
demnation. How  he  has  been  led  to  this  change 
becomes,  therefore,  a  most  interesting  inquiry,  not 
merely  from  the  great  importance  of  the  subject  it- 
self, but  from  the  light  it  must  throw  on  the  logical 
processes  of  so  eminent  a  philosopher. 

Since  no  one  else  has  attempted  it,  it  seems  incum- 
bent on  me  to  examine  this  change  and  its  grounds. 
For  not  only  do  I  hold  the  opinions  which  Mr. 
Spencer  now  controverts,  but  I  have  been  directly  and 
indirectly  instrumental  in  giving  to  his  earlier  con- 
clusions a  much  greater  circulation  than  his  own 
books  would  have  given  them.  It  is  due,  therefore, 
that  I  should  make  his  rejection  of  these  conclusions 


THE   REASON   FOR   THIS   EXAMINATION.  11 

as  widely  known  as  I  can,  and  thus  correct  the 
mistake  of  those  who  couple  us  together  as  holding 
views  he  now  opposes. 

To  fairly  weigh  Mr.  Spencer's  present  opinion  on 
the  land  question,  and  to  comprehend  his  reasons  for 
the  change,  it  is  necessary  to  understand  his  previous 
position.  Beginning,  therefore,  with  his  first  declar- 
ation, I  propose  to  trace  his  public  expressions  on  this 
subject  to  the  present  time,  and,  that  no  injustice  may 
be  done  him,  to  print  them  in  full.  In  what  follows 
the  reader  will  find  what  Mr.  Spencer  has  published 
on  the  land  question  from  1850  to  1892,  and,  by  the 
difference  in  tjrpe,  may  readily  distinguish  his  utter- 
ances from  my  comments. 


I^^HT  I. 

DECLARATION. 


I-  "SOCIAL  STATICS."  — THP:  RIGHT  TO  LAND. 

XL  THE   INCONGRUOUS  PASSAGE. 

III.  "SOCIAL  STATICS."  — THE  RIGHT  OF  PROPERTY. 

IV.  MR.  SPENCER'S  CONFUSION  AS   TO  RIGHTS. 
V.  MR.  SPENCER'S  CONFUSION  AS  TO  VALUE. 

VI.  FROM  "  SOCIAL  STATICS  "  TO  "  POLITICAL  INSTITUTIONS." 


Our  social  edifice  may  be  constructed  with  all  possible  labor  and  ingenuity, 
and  be  strongly  cramped  together  with  cunningly-devised  enactments,  but  if 
there  be  no  rectitude  in  its  component  parts,  if  it  is  not  built  on  upright 
principles,  it  will  assuredly  tumble  to  pieces.  .  .  ,  Not  as  adventitious, 
therefore,  will  the  wise  man  regard  the  faith  that  is  in  him,  not  as  something 
which  may  be  slighted,  and  made  subordinate  to  calculations  of  policy ;  but  as 
the  supreme  authority  to  which  all  his  actions  should  bend.  The  highest  truth 
conceivable  by  him  he  (vill  fearlessly  utter;  and  will  endeavor  to  get  embodied 
in  fact  his  purest  idealisms  :  knowing  that,  let  what  may  come  of  it,  he  is  thus 
playing  his  appointed  part  in  the  world  —  knowing  that,  if  he  can  get  done 
the  thing  he  aims  at  — well  :  if  not — well  also;  though  not  so  well. — Her' 
bert  Spencer,  1350. 


CHAPTER  I. 

"  SOCIAL   STATICS  "  —  THE   RIGHT   TO   LAND. 

In  his  first  book,  "  Social  Statics,"  published  in 
1850,  Mr.  Spencer  essayed  to  discover  some  fixed 
principle  that  might  serve  as  a  starting-point  in  po- 
litical ethics  and  afford  a  surer  guide  than  shifting 
notions  of  expediency  or  the  vague  formula  of  the 
greatest  good  to  the  greatest  number.  He  found  it 
in  the  principle  that  "  every  man  may  claim  the  full- 
est liberty  to  exercise  his  faculties  compatible  with 
the  possession  of  like  liberty  by  every  other  man." 
Or,  as  he  otherwise  puts  it,  that  "every  man  has 
freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes 
not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other  man." 

The  fu'st  deduction  he  makes  from  this  "  first  prin- 
ciple "  is  the  equal  right  to  life  and  personal  liberty, 
and  the  second,  the  equal  right  to  the  use  of  the 
earth. 

This  first  deduction  he  treats  briefly  in  Chapter 
VIII.,  "  The  Rights  of  Life  and  Personal  Liberty," 
saying,  "These  are  such  evident  corollaries  from  our 
first  principle  as  scarcely  to  need  a  separate  state- 
ment." 

The  second  deduction,  only  next  in  importance  to 
the  rights  to  life  and  personal  liberty,  and  indeed  in- 
volved in  them,  he  treats  at  length  in  a  chapter 
wliich  I  give  in  full : 


16  DECLARATION. 


CHAPTER    IX. THE   RIGHT   TO    THE   USE   OF   THE    EARTH. 

§  1.  Given  a  race  of  beings  having  like  claims  to 
pursue  the  objects  of  their  desires  —  given  a  world 
adapted  to  the  gratification  of  those  desires  —  a  world 
into  which  such  beings  are  similarly  born,  and  it  un- 
avoidably follows  that  they  have  equal  rights  to  the  use 
of  this  world.  For  if  each  of  them  "has  freedom  to  do 
all  that  he  wills  provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal 
freedom  of  any  other,"  then  each  of  them  is  free  to  use 
the  earth  for  the  satisfaction  of  his  wants,  provided  he 
allows  all  others  the  same  liberty.  And  conversely,  it  is 
manifest  that  no  one,  or  part  of  them,  may  use  the  earth 
in  such  a  way  as  to  prevent  the  rest  from  similarly  using 
it ;  seeing  that  to  do  this  is  to  assume  greater  freedom 
than  the  rest,  and  consequently  to  break  the  law. 

§  2.  Equity,  therefore,  does  not  permit  property  in 
land.  For  if  one  portion  of  the  earth's  surface  may 
justly  become  the  possession  of  an  individual,  and  may 
be  held  by  him  for  his  sole  use  and  benefit,  as  a  thing 
to  which  he  has  an  exclusive  right,  then  other  portions 
of  the  earth's  surface  may  be  so  held ;  and  eventually 
the  whole  of  the  earth's  surface  may  be  so  held;  and 
our  planet  may  thus  lapse  altogether  into  private  hands. 
Observe  now  the  dilemma  to  which  this  leads.  Suppos- 
ing the  entire  habitable  globe  to  be  so  enclosed,  it  follows 
that  if  the  land-owners  have  a  valid  right  to  its  surface, 
all  who  are  not  land-owners  have  no  right  at  all  to  its 
surface.  Hence,  such  can  exist  on  the  earth  by  suffer- 
ance only.  They  are  all  trespassers.  Save  by  the  per- 
mission of  the  lords  of  the  soil,  they  can  have  no  room 
for  the  soles  of  their  feet.  Nay,  should  the  others  think 
fit  to  deny  them  a  resting-place,  these  landless  men  might 
equitably  be  expelled  from  the  earth  altogether.  If, 
then,  the  assumption  that  land  can  be  held  as  property, 
involves  that  the  whole  globe  may  become  the  private 
domain  of  a  part  of  its  inhabitants ;  and  if,  by  conse- 
quence, the  rest  of  its  inhabitants  can  then  exercise  their 
faculties  —  can  then  exist  even  —  only  by  consent  of  the 
land-owners ;  it  is  manifest,  that  an  exclusive  possession 


"SOCIAL   statics" — THE   EIGHT   TO   LAND.       17 

of  the  "soil  necessitates  an  infringement  of  the  hiw  of 
equal  freedom.  For,  men  who  cannot  '•'  live  and  move 
and  have  their  being  "  without  the  leave  of  others,  can- 
not be  equally  free  with  those  others. 

§  3.  Passing  from  the  consideration  of  the  possible 
to  that  of  the  actual,  we  find  yet  further  reason  to  deny 
the  rectitude  of  property  in  land.  It  can  never  be  pre- 
tended that  the  existing  titles  to  such  property  are  legiti- 
mate. Should  any  one  think  so,  let  him  look  in  the 
chronicles.  Violence,  fraud,  the  prerogative  of  force,  the 
claims  of  superior  cunning  —  these  are  the  sources  to 
which  those  titles  may  be  traced.  The  original  deeds 
were  written  with  the  sword,  rather  than  with  the  pen  : 
not  lawyers,  but  soldiers,  were  the  conveyancers  :  blows 
were  the  current  coin  given  in  payment ;  and  for  seals, 
blood  was  used  in  preference  to  wax.  Could  valid  claims 
be  thus  constituted  ?  Hardly.  And  if  not,  what  be- 
comes of  the  pretensions  of  all  subsequent  holders  of 
estates  so  obtained  ?  Does  sale  or  bequest  generate  a 
right  where  it  did  not  previously  exist  ?  Would  the 
original  claimants  be  nonsuited  at  the  bar  of  reason, 
because  the  tiling  stolen  from  them  had  changed  hands  ? 
Certainly  not.  And  if  one  act  of  transfer  can  give  no 
title,  can  many  ?  No  :  though  nothing  be  multiplied  for- 
ever, it  will  not  produce  one.  Even  the  law  recognizes 
this  principle.  An  existing  holder  must,  if  called  upon, 
substantiate  the  claims  of  those  from  whom  he  pur- 
chased or  inherited  his  property;  and  any  flaw  in  the 
original  parchment,  even  though  the  property  should  have 
had  a  score  intermediate  owners,  quashes  his  right. 

''But  Time,"  say  some,  ''is  a  great  legalizer.  Imme- 
morial possession  must  be  taken  to  constitute  a  legiti- 
mate claim.  That  which  has  been  held  from  age  to  age 
as  private  property,  and  has  been  bought  and  sold  as 
such,  must  now  be  considered  as  irrevocably  belonging 
to  individuals."  To  which  proposition  a  willing  assent 
shall  be  given  when  its  propounders  can  assign  it  a  defi- 
nite meaning.  To  do  this,  however,  they  must  find 
satisfactory  answers  to  such  questions  as,  How  long  does 
it  take  for  what  was  originally  a  wrong  to  grow  into  a 
right?      At   what  rate  per    annum  do   invalid   claims 


18  DECLARATION. 

become  valid  ?  If  a  title  gets  perfect  in  a  thousand 
years,  how  much  more  than  perfect  will  it  be  in  two  thou- 
sand years  ?  —  and  so  forth.  For  the  solution  of  which 
they  will  require  a  new  calculus. 

Whether  it  may  be  expedient  to  admit  claims  of  a  cer- 
tain standing,  is  not  the  point.  We  have  here  nothing 
to  do  with  considerations  of  conventional  privilege  or 
legislative  convenience.  We  have  simply  to  inquire 
Vv'hat  is  the  verdict  given  by  pure  equity  in  the  matter. 
And  this  verdict  enjoins  a  protest  against  every  existing 
pretension  to  the  individual  possession  of  the  soil ;  and 
dictates  the  assertion,  that  the  right  of  mankind  at  large 
to  the  earth's  surface  is  still  valid ;  all  deeds,  customs,  and 
laws  notwithstanding. 

§  4.  Not  only  have  present  land-tenures  an  indefen- 
sible origin,  but  it  is  impossible  to  discover  any  mode  in 
whicli  land  can  become  private  property.  Cultivation  is 
commonly  considered  to  give  a  legitimate  title.  He  who 
has  reclaimed  a  tract  of  ground  from  its  primitive  wild- 
ness,  is  supposed  to  have  thereby  made  it  his  own.  But 
if  his  right  is  disputed,  by  what  system  of  logic  can  he 
vindicate  it  ?     Let  ns  listen  a  moment  to  his  pleadings. 

*'  Hallo,  you  Sir,"  cries  the  cosmopolite  to  some  back- 
woodsman, smoking  at  the  door  of  his  shanty,  "  by  what 
authority  do  you  take  possession  of  these  acres  that  you 
have  cleared ;  round  which  you  have  put  up  a  snake- 
fence,  and  on  which  j^ou  have  built  this  log  house  ?  " 

"  By  what  authority  ?  I  squatted  here  because  there 
"was  no  one  to  say  nay  —  because  I  was  as  much  at  liberty 
to  do  so  as  any  other  man.  Besides,  now  that  I  liave  cut 
down  the  wood,  and  ploughed  and  cropped  the  ground, 
this  farm  is  more  mine  than  yours,  or  anybody's  ;  and  I 
mean  to  keep  it." 

''  Ay,  so  you  all  say.  But  I  do  not  yet  see  how  you 
have  substantiated  your  claim.  When  you  came  here  you 
found  the  land  producing  trees  —  sugar-maples,  perhaps  ; 
or  may  be  it  was  covered  with  prairie-grass  and  wild 
strawberries.  Well,  instead  of  these  you  made  it  yield 
wheat,  or  maize,  or  tobacco.  Now  I  want  to  understand 
how,  by  exterminating  one  set  of  plants,  and  making  the 
soil  bear  another  set  in  their  place,  you  have  constituted 
yourself  lord  of  this  soil  for  all  succeeding  time." 


"SOCIAL   statics"  —  THE  EIGHT   TO   LAND.      19 

''Oh,  those  natural  products  which  I  destroyed  were 
of  little  or  no  use ;  whereas  I  caused  the  earth  to  bring 
forth  things  good  for  food  —  things  that  help  to  give  life 
and  happiness." 

"  Still  you  have  not  shown  why  such  a  process  makes 
the  portion  of  earth  you  have  so  modified  yours.  What 
is  it  that  you  have  done  ?  You  have  turned  over  the 
soil  to  a  few  inches  in  depth  with  a  spade  or  a  plough  ; 
you  have  scattered  over  this  prepared  surface  a  few 
seeds ;  and  you  have  gathered  the  fruits  which  the  sun, 
rain,  and  air,  helped  the  soil  to  produce.  Just  tell  me, 
if  you  please,  by  what  magic  have  these  acts  made  you 
sole  owner  of  that  vast  mass  of  matter,  having  for  its 
base  the  surface  of  your  estate,  and  for  its  apex  the 
centre  of  the  globe  ?  all  of  which  it  appears  you  would 
monopolize  to  yourself  and  your  descendants  forever." 

*'  Well,  if  it  isn't  mine,  whose  is  it  ?  I  have  dispos- 
sessed nobody.  When  I  crossed  the  Mississippi  yonder, 
I  found  nothing  but  the  silent  woods.  If  some  one  else 
had  settled  here,  and  made  this  clearing,  he  would  have 
had  as  good  a  right  to  the  location  as  I  have.  I  have 
done  nothing  but  what  any  other  person  was  at  liberty 
to  do  had  he  come  before  me.  Whilst  they  were  un- 
reclaimed, these  lands  belonged  to  all  men  —  as  much 
to  one  as  to  another  —  and  they  are  now  mine  simply 
because  I  was  the  first  to  discover  and  improve  them." 

"  You  say  truly,  when  you  say  that  '  whilst  they  were 
unreclaimed  these  lands  belonged  to  all  men.'  And  it  is 
my  duty  to  tell  you  that  they  belong  to  all  men  still ; 
and  that  your  'improvements  '  as  you  call  them,  cannot 
vitiate  the  claim  of  all  men.  You  may  plough  and  har- 
row, and  sow  and  reap ;  you  may  turn  over  the  soil  as 
often  as  you  like  ;  but  all  your  manipulations  will  fail  to 
make  that  soil  yours,  which  was  not  yours  to  begin  with. 
Let  me  put  a  case.  Suppose  now  that  in  the  course  of 
your  Avanderings  you  come  upon  an  empty  house,  which 
in  spite  of  its  dilapidated  state  takes  your  fancy ;  sup- 
pose that  with  the  intention  of  making  it  your  abode 
you  expend  much  time  and  trouble  in  repairing  it  —  that 
you  paint  and  paper,  and  Avhitewash,  and  at  considerable 
cost  bring  it  into  a  habitable  state.  Suppose  further, 
that  on  some  fatal  day  a  stranger  is  announced,  who 
turns  out  to  be  the  heir  to  whom  this  house  has  been 


20  DECLARATION. 

bequeathed;  and  that  this  professed  heir  is  prepared 
with  all  the  necessary  proofs  of  his  identity ;  what  be- 
comes of  your  improvements  ?  Do  they  give  you  a  valid 
title  to  the  house  ?  Do  they  quash  the  title  of  the 
original  claimant  ?  " 

"No." 

"Neither  then  do  your  pioneering  operations  give  you 
a  valid  title  to  this  land.  Neither  do  they  quash  the 
title  of  its  original  claimants  —  the  human  race.  The 
world  is  God's  bequest  to  mankind.  All  men  are  joint 
heirs  to  it ;  you  amongst  the  number.  And  because  you 
have  taken  up  your  residence  on  a  certain  part  of  it,  and 
have  subdued,  cultivated,  beautified  that  part  —  im- 
proved it  as  you  say,  you  are  not  therefore  warranted  in 
appropriating  it  as  entirely  private  property.  At  least 
if  you  do  so,  you  may  at  any  moment  be  justly  expelled 
by  the  lawful  owner  —  Society." 

"  Well,  but  surely  you  would  not  eject  me  without 
making  some  recompense  for  the  great  additional  value 
I  have  given  to  this  tract,  by  reducing  what  was  a  wilder- 
ness into  fertile  fields.  You  would  not  turn  me  adrift 
and  deprive  me  of  all  the  benefit  of  those  years  of  toil  it 
has  cost  me  to  bring  this  spot  into  its  present  state." 

"Of  course  not:  just  as  in  the  case  of  the  house,  you 
would  have  an  equitable  title  to  compensation  from  the 
proprietor  for  repairs  and  new  fittings,  so  the  community 
cannot  justly  take  possession  of  this  estate,  without  pay- 
ing for  all  that  you  have  done  to  it.  This  extra  worth 
which  your  labor  has  imparted  to  it  is  fairly  yours ;  and 
although  jou  have,  Avithout  leave,  busied  yourself  in 
bettering  what  belongs  to  the  community,  yet  no  doubt 
the  community  will  duly  discharge  your  claim.  But  ad- 
mitting this,  is  quite  a  different  thing  from  recognizing 
your  right  to  the  land  itself.  It  may  be  true  that  you 
are  entitled  to  compensation  for  the  improvements  this 
enclosure  has  received  at  your  hands ;  and  at  the  same 
time  it  may  be  equally  true  that  no  act,  form,  proceeding, 
or  ceremony,  can  make  this  enclosure  your  private  prop- 
erty." 

§  5.  It  does  indeed  at  first  sight  seem  possible  for 
the  earth  to  become  the  exclusive  possession  of  individ- 
uals by  some  process  of  equitable  distribution.     "  "Why," 


"SOCIAL  statics" — THE  RIGHT   TO   LAND.      21 

it  may  be  asked,  "  should  not  men  agree  to  a  fair  sub- 
division ?  If  all  are  co-heirs,  why  may  not  the  estate 
be  equally  apportioned,  and  each  be  afterwards  perfect 
master  of  his  own  share  ?  " 

To  this  question  it  may  in  the  first  place  be  replied, 
that  such  a  division  is  vetoed  by  the  difficulty  of  fixing 
the  values  of  respective  tracts  of  land.  Variations  in 
productiveness,  different  degrees  of  accessibility,  advan- 
tages of  climate,  proximity  to  the  centres  of  civilization 
—  these,  and  other  such  considerations,  remove  the  prob- 
lem out  of  the  sphere  of  mere  mensuration  into  the 
region  of  impossibility. 

But,  waiving  this,  let  us  inquire  who  are  to  be  the  al- 
lottees. Shall  adult  males,  and  all  who  have  reached 
twenty-one  on  a  specified  day,  be  the  fortunate  individ- 
uals ?  If  so,  what  is  to  be  done  with  those  who  come 
of  age  on  the  morrow  ?  Is  it  proposed  that  each  man, 
woman,  and  child,  shall  have  a  section  ?  If  so,  what  be- 
comes of  all  who  are  to  be  born  next  year  ?  And  what 
will  be  the  fate  of  those  whose  fathers  sell  their  estates 
and  squander  the  proceeds  ?  These  portionless  ones 
must  constitute  a  class  already  described  as  having  no 
right  to  a  resting-place  on  earth  —  as  living  by  the  suf- 
ferance of  their  fellow-men  —  as  being  practically  serfs. 
And  the  existence  of  such  a  class  is  wholly  at  variance 
with  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

Until,  therefore,  we  can  produce  a  valid  commission 
authorizing  us  to  make  this  distribution  —  until  it  can 
be  proved  that  God  has  given  one  charter  of  privileges 
to  one  generation,  and  another  to  the  next  —  until  we 
can  demonstrate  that  men  born  after  a  certain  date  are 
doomed  to  slavery,  we  must  consider  that  no  such  allot- 
ment is  permissible. 

§  6.  Probably  some  will  regard  the  difficulties  insep- 
arable from  individual  ownership  of  the  soil,  as  caused 
by  pushing  to  excess  a  doctrine  applicable  only  within 
rational  limits.  This  is  a  very  favorite  style  of  thinking 
with  some.  There  are  people  who  hate  anything  in  the 
shape  of  exact  conclusions  ;  and  these  are  of  them.  Ac- 
cording to  such,  the  right  is  never  in  either  extreme,  but 
always  half  way  between  the  extremes.  They  are  con- 
tinually trying  to  reconcile   Yes  and  No.     Ifs  and  buts, 


22  DECLAKATION. 

and  excepts,  are  their  delight.  They  have  so  great  a 
faitA  in  "the  judicious  mean"  that  they  would  scarcely 
helieve  an  oracle,  if  it  uttered  a  full-length  principle. 
Were  you  to  inquire  of  them  whether  the  earth  turns  on 
its  axis  frona  East  to  West,  or  from  West  to  East,  you 
might  almost  expect  the  reply  —  "A  little  of  both,"  or 
"Not  exactly  either."  It  is  doubtful  whether  they  would 
assent  to  the  axiom  that  the  whole  is  greater  than  its 
part,  without  making  some  qualification.  They  have  a 
passion  for  compromises.  To  meet  their  taste.  Truth 
must  always  be  spiced  with  a  little  Error.  They  cannot 
conceive  of  a  pure,  definite,  entire,  and  unlimited  law. 
And  hence,  in  discussions  like  the  present,  they  are 
constantly  petitioning  for  limitations  —  always  wishing 
to  abate,  and  modify,  and  moderate  —  ever  protesting 
against  doctrines  being  pursued  to  their  ultimate  conse- 
quences. 

But  it  behooves  such  to  recollect,  that  ethical  truth  is 
as  exact  and  as  peremptory  as  physical  truth ;  and  that 
in  this  matter  of  land-tenure,  the  verdict  of  morality 
must  be  distinctly  yea  or  nay.  Either  men  have  a  right 
to  make  the  soil  private  property,  or  they  have  not. 
There  is  no  medium.  We  must  choose  one  of  the  two 
positions.  There  can  be  no  half-and-half  opinion.  In 
the  nature  of  things  the  fact  must  be  either  one  way  or 
the  other. 

If  men  have  not  such  a  right,  we  are  at  once  delivered 
from  the  several  predicaments  already  pointed  out.  If 
they  have  such  a  right,  then  is  that  right  absolute, 
sacred,  not  on  any  pretence  to  be  violated.  If  they  have 
such  a  right,  then  is  his  Grace  of  Leeds  justified  in 
warning-off  tourists  from  Ben  Mac  Dhui,  the  Duke  of 
Atholl  in  closing  Glen  Tilt,  the  Duke  of  Buccleuch  in 
denying  sites  to  the  Free  Church,  and  the  Duke  of 
Sutherland  in  banishing  the  Highlanders  to  make  room 
for  sheep-walks.  If  they  have  such  a  right,  then  it 
would  be  proper  for  the  sole  proprietor  of  any  kingdom 
—  a  Jersey  or  Giiernsey,  for  example  —  to  impose  just 
what  regulations  he  might  choose  on  its  inhabitants  — 
to  tell  them  that  they  should  not  live  on  his  property, 
unless  they  professed  a  certain  religion,  spoke  a  particu- 
lar language,  paid  him  a  specified  reverence,  adopted  an 
authorized  dress,  and  conformed  to  all  other  conditions 


"SOCIAL   statics"  —  THE   EIGHT   TO   LAND.      23 

he  might  see  fit  to  make.  If  they  have  such  a  right, 
then  is  there  truth  in  that  tenet  of  the  ultra-Tory  school, 
that  the  land-owners  are  the  only  legitimate  rulers  of  a 
country  — that  the  people  at  large  remain  in  it  only  by 
the  land-owners'  permission,  and  ought  consequently  to 
submit  to  the  land-owners'  rule,  and  respect  whatever  in- 
stitutions the  land-owners  set  up.  There  is  no  escape 
from  these  inferences.  They  are  necessary  corollaries 
to  the  theory  that  the  earth  can  become  individual  prop- 
erty. And  they  can  only  be  repudiated  by  denying  that 
theory. 

§  7.  After  all,  nobody  does  implicity  believe  in 
landlordism.  We  hear  of  estates  being  held  under  the 
king,  that  is,  the  state;  or  of  their  being  kept  in  trust 
for  the  public  benefit ;  and  not  that  they  are  the  in- 
alienable possessions  of  their  nominal  owners.  More- 
over, we  daily  deny  landlordism  by  our  legislation.  Is 
a  canal,  a  railwa}',  or  a  turnpike  road  to  be  made  ?  we 
do  not  scruple  to  seize  just  as  many  acres  as  may  be 
requisite ;  allowing  the  holders  compensation  for  the 
capital  invested.  We  do  not  wait  for  consent.  An  Act 
of  Parliament  supersedes  the  authority  of  title  deeds, 
and  serves  proprietors  with  notices  to  quit,  whether  they 
will  or  not.  Either  this  is  equitable,  or  it  is  not.  Either 
the  public  are  free  to  resume  as  much  of  the  earth's  sur- 
face as  they  think  fit,  or  the  titles  of  the  land-owners 
must  be  considered  absolute,  and  all  national  works  must 
be  postponed  i;ntil  lords  and  squires  please  to  part  with 
the  requisite  slices  of  their  estates.  If  we  decide  that 
the  claims  of  individual  ownership  must  give  way,  then 
we  imply  that  the  right  of  the  nation  at  large  to  the  soil 
is  supreme  —  that  the  right  of  private  possession  only 
exists  by  general  consent  —  that  general  consent. being 
withdrawn  it  ceases  —  or,  in  other  words,  that  it  is  no 
right  at  all. 

§  8.  "But  to  what  does  this  doctrine,  that  men  are 
equally  entitled  to  the  use  of  the  earth,  lead  ?  Must  we 
return  to  the  times  of  unenclosed  wilds,  and  subsist  on 
roots,  berries,  and  game  ?  Or  are  we  to  be  left  to  the 
management  of  Messrs.  Fourier,  Owen,  Louis  Blanc, 
and  Co.  ?  " 


24  DECLAKATION. 

Neither.  Such  a  doctrine  is  consistent  with  the  high- 
est state  of  civilization ;  may  be  carried  out  without 
involving  a  community  of  goods  ;  and  need  cause  no  very 
serious  revolution  in  existing  arrangements.  The  change 
required  would  simply  be  a  change  of  landlords.  Sepa- 
rate ownerships  would  merge  into  the  joint-stock  owner- 
ship of  the  public.  Instead  of  being  in  the  possession  of 
individuals,  the  country  would  be  held  by  the  great  cor- 
porate body  —  Society.  Instead  of  leasing  his  acres  from 
an  isolated  proprietor,  the  farmer  would  lease  them  from 
the  nation.  Instead  of  paying  his  rent  to  the  agent  of 
Sir  John  or  his  Grace,  he  would  pay  it  to  an  agent  or 
deput3^-agent  of  the  community.  Stewards  would  be 
public  officials  instead  of  private  ones  ;  and  tenancy  the 
only  land-tenure. 

A  state  of  things  so  ordered  would  be  in  perfect  har- 
mony with  the  moral  law.  Under  it  all  men  would  be 
equally  landlords  ;  all  men  would  be  alike  free  to  become 
tenants.  A,  B,  C,  and  the  rest,  might  compete  for  a 
vacant  farm  as  now,  and  one  of  them  might  take  that 
farm,  without  in  any  way  violating  the  principles  of  pure 
equity.  All  would  be  equally  free  to  bid ;  all  would  be 
equally  free  to  refrain.  And  when  the  farm  had  been 
let  to  A,  B,  or  C,  all  parties  would  have  done  that  which 
they  willed  —  the  one  in  choosing  to  pay  a  given  sum  to 
lis  fellow-men  for  the  use  of  certain  lands — the  others 
in  refusing  to  pay  that  sum.  Clearl}',  therefore,  on  such 
a  system,  the  earth  might  be  enclosed,  occupied,  and 
cultivated,  in  entire  subordination  to  the  law  of  equal 
freedom. 

§  9.  Nc  doubt  great  difficulties  must  attend  the  re- 
sumption, by  mankind  at  large,  of  their  rights  to  the 
soil.  The  question  of  compensation  to  existing  proprie- 
tors is  a  complicated  one  —  one  that  perhaps  cannot  be 
settled  in  a  strictly  equitable  manner.  Had  we  to  deal 
with  the  parties  who  originally  robbed  the  human  race 
of  its  heritage,  we  might  make  short  work  of  the  matter. 
But,  unfortunately,  most  of  our  pr.esent  land-owners  are 
m.en  who  have,  either  mediately  or  immediately  —  either 
by  their  own  acts,  or  by  the  acts  of  their  ancestors  — 
given  for  their  estates,  equivalents  of  honestly-earned 
wealth;  believing  that  they  were  investing  their  savings 


"  SOCIAL   STATICS  "  —  THE   RIGHT   TO   LAND.      25 

in  a  legitimate  manner.  To  justly  estimate  and  liqui- 
date the  claims  of  such,  is  one  of  the  most  intricate  prob- 
lems society  will  one  day  have  to  solve.  But  with  this 
perplexity  and  our  extrication  from  it,  abstract  morality 
has  no  concern.  Men  having  got  themselves  into  the 
dilemma  by  disobedience  to  the  law,  must  get  out  of  it  as 
well  as  they  can  ;  and  with  as  little  injury  to  the  landed 
class  as  may  be. 

Meanwhile,  we  shall  do  well  to  recollect,  that  there 
are  others  besides  the  landed  class  to  be  considered.  In 
our  tender  regard  for  the  vested  interests  of  the  few,  let 
us  not  forget  that  the  rights  of  the  many  are  in  abeyance ; 
and  must  remain  so,  as  long  as  the  earth  is  monopolized 
by  individuals.  Let  us  remember,  too,  that  the  injustice 
thus  inflicted  on  the  mass  of  mankind,  is  an  injustice  of 
the  gravest  nature.  The  fact  that  it  is  not  so  regarded, 
proves  nothing.  In  early  phases  of  civilization  even 
homicide  is  thought  lightly  of.  The  suttees  of  India, 
together  with  the  practice  elsewhere  followed  of  sacri- 
ficing a  hecatomb  of  human  victims  at  the  burial  of  a 
chief,  shows  this  ;  and  probably  cannibals  consider  the 
slaughter  of  those  whom  '*  the  fortune  of  war  "  has  made 
their  prisoners,  perfectly  justifiable.  It  was  once  also 
universally  supposed  that  slavery  was  a  natural  and  quite 
legitimate  institution  —  a  condition  into  which  some 
were  born,  and  to  which  they  ought  to  submit  as  to  a 
Divine  ordination;  nay,  indeed,  a  great  proportion  of 
mankind  hold  this  opinion  still.  A  higher  social  devel- 
opment, however,  has  generated  in  us  a  better  faith,  and 
we  now  to  a  considerable  extent  recognize  the  claims  of 
humanity.  But  our  civilization  is  only  partial.  It  may 
by-and-by  be  perceived,  that  Equity  utters  dictates  to 
which  we  have  not  yet  listened  ;  and  men  may  then 
learn,  that  to  deprive  others  of  their  rights  to  the  use  of 
the  earth,  is  to  commit  a  crime  inferior  only  in  wicked- 
ness to  the  crime  of  taking  away  their  lives  or  personal 
liberties. 

§  10.  Briefly  reviewing  the  argument,  we  see  that 
the  right  of  each' man  to  tlie  use  of  the  earth,  limited 
only  by  the  like  riglits  of  his  fellow-men,  is  immediately 
deducible  from  the  law  of  equal  freedom.  We  see  that 
the  maintenance  of  this  right  necessarily  forbids  private 


26  DECLARATION. 

property  in  land.  On  examination  all  existing  titles  to 
such  property  turn  out  to  be  invalid ;  those  founded  on 
reclamation  inclusive.  It  appears  that  not  even  an  equal 
apportionment  of  the  earth  amongst  its  inhabitants  could 
generate  a  legitimate  proprietorship.  We  find  that  if 
pushed  to  its  ultimate  consequences,  a  claim  to  exclusive 
possession  of  the  soil  involves  a  land-owning  despotism. 
We  further  find  that  such  a  claim  is  constantly  denied 
by  the  enactments  of  our  legislature.  And  we  find 
lastly,  that  the  theory  of  the  co-heirship  of  all  men  to 
the  soil,  is  consistent  with  the  highest  civilization ;  and 
that,  however  difficult  it  may  be  to  embody  that  theory 
in  fact,  Equity  sternly  commands  it  to  be  done. 


Briefly  stated,  the  argument  of  this  chapter  is  — 

1.  The  equal  right  of  all  men  to  the  use  of  land 
springs  from  the  fact  of  their  existence  in  a  world 
adapted  to  their  needs,  and  into  which  they  are  simi- 
larly born. 

2.  Equity,  therefore,  does  not  permit  private  prop- 
erty in  land,  since  that  would  involve  the  right  of 
some  to  deny  to  others  the  use  of  land. 

3.  Private  property  in  land,  as  at  present  existing, 
can  show  no  original  title  valid  in  justice,  and  such 
validity  cannot  be  gained  either  by  sale  or  bequest, 
or  by  peaceable  possession  during  any  length  of 
time. 

4.  Nor  is  there  any  mode  by  which  land  can  justly 
become  private  property.  Cultivation  and  improve- 
ment can  give  title  only  to  their  results,  not  to  the 
land  itself. 

5.  Nor  could  an  equitable  division  of  land  with 
the  consent  of  all,  even  if  it  were  not  impossible 
that  such  a  division  could  be  made,  give  valid  title  to 
private  property  in  land.  For  the  equal  right  to  the 
use  of  land  would  attach  to  all  those  thereafter  born, 


"  SOCIAL   STATICS  "  —  THE   RIGHT   TO   LAND.      27 

irrespective  of  any  agreement  made  by  their  prede- 
cessors. 

6.  There  can  be  no  modification  of  this  dictate  of 
equity.  Either  all  men  have  equal  rights  to  the  use 
of  the  land,  or  some  men  have  the  just  right  to  en- 
slave others  and  deprive  them  of  life. 

7.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  nobody  does  really  believe 
in  private  property  in  land.  An  Act  of  Parliament, 
even  now,  supersedes  title-deeds.  That  is  to  say, 
the  right  of  private  ownership  in  land  only  exists  by 
general  consent ;  that  being  withdrawn,  it  ceases. 

8.  But  the  doctrine  that  all  men  are  equally  en- 
titled to  the  use  of  land  does  not  involve  communism 
or  socialism,  and  need  cause  no  serious  change  in  exist- 
ing arrangements.  It  is  not  necessary  that  the  state 
should  manage  land :  it  is  only  necessary  that  rent, 
instead  of  going,  as  now,  to  individuals,  should  be 
taken  by  society  for  common  purposes. 

9.  There  may  be  difficulty  in  justly  liquidating 
the  claims  of  existing  land-owners,  but  men  having 
got  themselves  into  a  dilemma  must  get  out  of  it  as 
well  as  they  can.  The  landed  class  are  not  alone 
to  be  considered.  So  long  as  the  treatment  of  land 
as  private  property  continues,  the  masses  suffer  from 
an  injustice  only  inferior  in  wickedness  to  depriving 
them  of  life  or  personal  liberty. 

10.  However  difficult  it  may  be  to  embody  in  fact 
the  theory  of  the  co-heirship  of  all  men  to  the  soil, 
equity  sternly  demands  it  to  be  done. 


CHAPTER   II. 

THE  INCONGKUOUS   PASSAGE. 

Although  this  chapter  shows  that  Mr.  Spencer 
had  not  full}-  thought  out  the  question,  and  saw  no 
way  to  secure  equality  in  the  use  of  hind,  save  the 
clumsy  one  of  having  the  state  formally  resume  land 
and  let  it  out  in  lots  to  suit,  the  argument  is  clear  and 
logical,  except  in  one  place.  This  one  weak  and  con- 
fusing spot  is  the  beginning  of  Section  9 : 

No  doubt  great  difficulty  must  attend  the  resumption 
by  mankind  at  large,  of  their  rights  to  the  soil.  The 
question  of  compensation  to  existing  proprietors  is  a 
complicated  one  —  one  that  perhaj)s  cannot  be  settled  in 
a  strictly  equitable  manner.  Had  we  to  deal  with  the 
parties  who  originally  robbed  the  human  race  of  its  heri- 
tage, we  might  make  short  work  of  the  matter.  But,  un- 
fortunately, most  of  our  present  land-owners  are  men  who 
have  either  mediately  or  immediately  —  either  by  their 
own  acts,  or  by  th«  acts  of  their  ancestors  —  given  for 
their  estates  equivalents  of  honestly  earned  wealth,  be- 
lieving that  they  were  investing  their  savings  in  a  legit- 
imate manner.  To  justly  estimate  and  liquidate  the 
claims  of  such  is  one  of  the  most  intricate  problems 
society  will  one  day  have  to  solve. 

Taken  by  itself,  this  passage  seems  to  admit  that 
existing  land-owners  should  be  compensated  for  the 
land  they  hold  whenever  society  shall  resume  land 
for  the  benefit  of  all.  Though  this  is  diametrically 
opposed  to  all   that   has   gone   before   and   all    that 


THE  INCONGRUOUS  PASSAGE.  29 

follows  after,  it  is  the  sense  in  which  it  has  been  gen- 
erally understood.  It  is  the  sense  in  which  I  under- 
stood it  when,  in  quoting  from  "  Social  Statics  "  in 
"  Progress  and  Poverty,"  I  spoke  of  it  as  a  careless 
concession,  which  Mr.  Spencer  on  reflection  would 
undoubtedly  reconsider.  For  after  even  such  a  man 
as  John  Stuart  Mill  could  say,  "  The  land  of  every 
country  belongs  to  the  people  of  that  country ;  the 
individuals  called  land-owners  have  no  right  in  moral- 
ity and  justice  to  anything  but  the  rent,  or  compen- 
sation for  its  salable  value,"  the  English  writers  had 
seemed  to  me  afflicted  with  a  sort  of  color-blindness 
on  the  subject  of  compensation.  And  that  this  afflic- 
tion had  suddenly  befallen  Mr.  Spencer  also  was  the 
onb^  explanation  of  this  passage  that  then  occurred  to 
me.  Nor,  if  it  means  compensation  for  land,  is  there 
any  other  explanation ;  for  all  along  JMr.  Spencer 
has  been  insisting  on  the  natural,  inalienable  and 
equal  right  of  all  men  to  the  use  of  land.  He  has 
not  only  denied  the  validity  of  all  existing  claims  to 
the  private  ownership  of  land,  but  has  declared  that 
theie  is  no  possible  way  in  which  land  can  become 
private  property.  He  has  mercilessly  and  scornfully 
exposed  the  fallacy  on  which  the  notion  of  compensa- 
tion to  land-owners  is  based  —  the  idea  that  change 
of  hands  and  lapse  of  time  can  turn  wrong  into  right, 
make  valid  claims  originally  invalid,  and  deprive  the 
human  race  of  what  in  the  nature  of  things  is,  not 
at  any  one  time,  but  at  all  times,  their  inalienable 
heritage.  Nothing  but  moral  color-blindness  can  ex- 
plain how  a  writer  who  has  just  asserted  all  this 
can  in  the  same  breath  propose  to  compensate  land- 
lords. 


30  DECLARATION. 

But  a  more  careful  reading  of  this  chapter  leads  me 
now  to  think  that  the  apparent  inconsistency  of  these 
sentences  may  arise  from  careless  statement,  and  that 
what  Mr.  Spencer  was  really  thinking  of  was  the 
compensation  of  land-owners,  not  for  their  land,  but 
for  their  improvements. 

In  the  context  Mr.  Spencer  has  scouted  the  idea  of 
force,  or  acquiescence,  or  voluntary  partition,  or  un- 
opposed appropriation,  or  cultivation,  or  improvement, 
or  sale  or  bequest,  or  lapse  of  time,  giving  any  title 
to  private  property  in  land.  But  he  realizes,  as  we 
all  do  (see  especially  the  last  two  paragraphs  of 
Section  4),  that  should  the  community  resume  for 
all  the  inalienable  right  to  the  use  of  land,  there 
would  remain  to  holders  of  improvements  made  in 
good  faith  an  equitable  claim  for  those  improve- 
ments. 

It  is  evident  throughout  "  Social  Statics  "  that  no 
idea  of  the  possibility  of  securing  equal  rights  to  land 
in  any  other  way  than  that  of  the  state  taking  posses- 
sion of  the  land  and  renting  it  out  had  dawned  on 
Mr.  Spencer.  And  since  in  all  settled  countries  the 
land  thus  taken  possession  of  by  the  state  would  be 
land  to  Avhich  in  large  part  improvements  of  various 
kinds  had  in  good  faith  been  inseparably  attached,  the 
matter  of  determining  what  equitable  compensation 
should  be  paid  to  owners  on  account  of  these  improve- 
ments naturally  seemed  to  him  a  delicate  and  difficult 
task  —  one,  in  fact,  incapable  of  more  than  an  approx- 
imation to  justice. 

Keeping  this  in  mind,  it  is  clear  that  a  few  interpo- 
lations, justified  by  the  context,  and  indeed  made 
necessary  by  it,  will  remove    all  difficulty.     Let  me 


THE   INCONGRITOUS   PASSAGE.  31 

print  these  sentences  again  with  such  interpolations, 

which  I  will  distinguish  by  italics : 

Tlie  question  of  compensation  to  existing  proprietors 
for  their  improvements  is  a  complicated  one  —  one  that 
perhaps  cannot  be  settled  in  a  strictly  equitable  manner. 
Had  we  to  deal  with  the  parties  who  originally  robbed 
the  human  race  of  its  heritage,  we  might  make  short 
work  of  the  matter, /o?'  their  improvements  we  should  be 
under  no  obligation  to  regard.  But,  unfortunately,  most 
of  our  present  land-holders  are  men  who  have,  either 
mediately  or  immediately  —  either  by  their  own  acts  or 
the  acts  of  their  ancestors  —  given  for  their  estates, 
ichich  include  viani/  inseparable  imjjrovemejits,  equiva- 
lents of  honestly  earned  wealth,  believing  that  they  were 
investing  their  savings  in  a  legitimate  manner.  To 
justly  estimate  and  liquidate  the  claims  of  such  for 
these  improvements  is  one  of  the  most  intricate  problems 
society  will  one  day  have  to  solve. 

Thus  understood,  these  sentences  become  coherent 
w^ith  their  context.  And  that  this  was  what  Mr. 
Spencer  had  in  mind  is  supported  by  his  more  recent 
utterances ;  for  while  he  has  allowed  these  sentences 
to  be  understood  as  meaning  compensation  to  land- 
owners for  their  land,  yet  in  the  only  places  where  he 
has  stated  in  terms  what  tlie  compensation  he  has 
proposed  is  to  be  for,  he  has,  as  will  hereafter  be  seen, 
spoken  of  it  as  "  compensation  for  the  artificial  value 
given  by  cultivation,"  or  by  some  similar  phrase 
showed  that  what  was  in  liis  mind  was  merely  com- 
pensation for  improvements.  I  therefore  gladly  make 
what  honorable  amend  I  can  for  having  so  misunder- 
stood him  as  to  imagine  that  in  "  Social  Statics  "  he 
intended  to  give  any  countenance  to  the  idea  that  it 
was  incumbent  on  men,  when  taking  possession  of 
their  heritage,  to  pay  any  compensation  to  existing 
land-owners  for  the  value  of  that  heritage. 


CHAPTER  III. 

"SOCIAL   statics"  —  THE   EIGHT   OF   PROPERTY. 

The  chapter  of  "Social  Statics"  on  "The  Right  to 
the  Use  of  the  Earth"  is  followed  by  a  chapter  on 
"  The  Right  of  Property."  For  the  reason  that  Mr. 
Spencer  has  since  referred  to  this  chapter  as  to  be 
taken  in  connection  with  what  was  said  in  the  pre- 
ceding one,  it  is  also  worth  while  to  reprint  it  in  full: 

CHAPTER  X.  —  THE  RIGHT  OF  PROPERTY. 

§  1.  The  moral  law,  being  the  law  of  the  social  state, 
is  obliged  wholly  to  ignore  the  ante-social  state.  Con- 
stituting, as  the  principles  of  pure  morality  do,  a  code 
of  conduct  for  the  perfect  man,  they  cannot  be  made  to 
adapt  themselves  to  the  actions  of  the  uncivilized  man, 
even  under  the  most  ingenious  hypothetical  conditions  — 
cannot  be  made  even  to  recognize  those  actions  so  as 
to  pass  any  definite  sentence  upon  them.  Overlooking 
this  fact,  thinkers,  in  their  attempts  to  prove  some  of 
the  first  theorems  of  ethics,  have  commonly  fallen  into 
the  error  of  referring  back  to  an  imaginary  state  of  sav- 
age wildness,  instead  of  referring  forward  to  an  ideal 
civilization,  as  they  should  have  done;  and  have,  in  con- 
sequence, entangled  themselves  in  difficulties  arising  out 
of  the  discordance  between  ethical  principles  and  the 
assumed  premises.  To  this  circumstance  is  attributable 
that  vagueness  by  which  the  arguments  used  to  estab- 
lish the  right  of  property  in  a  logical  manner,  are  char- 
acterized. Whilst  possessed  of  a  certain  plausibility, 
they  yet  cannot  be  considered  conclusive ;  inasmuch  as 
they  suggest  questions  and  objections  that  admit  of  uo 


"  SOCIAL  STATICS  "  —  THE  RIGHT  OF  PROPERTY.     33 

satisfactory  answers.  Let  us  take  a  sample  of  these 
arguments,  and  examine  its  defects. 

"Though  the  earth  and  all  inferior  creatures,"  says 
Locke,  "  be  common  to  all  men,  yet  every  man  has  a 
property  in  his  own  person  :  this  nobody  has  a  right  to 
but  himself.  The  labor  of  his  body,  and  the  work  of  his 
hands,  we  may  say  are  properly  his.  Whatever  then  he 
removes  out  of  the  state  that  nature  hath  provided  and 
left  it  in,  he  hath  mixed  his  labor  with,  and  joined  to  it 
something  that  is  his  own,  and  thereby  makes  it  his 
propert3\  It  being  by  him  removed  from  the  common 
state  nature  hath  placed  it  in,  it  hath  by  this  labor  some- 
thing annexed  to  it  that  excludes  the  common  right  of 
other  men.  For  this  labor  being  the  unq-uestionable 
property  of  the  laborer,  no  man  but  he  can  have  a  right 
to  what  that  is  once  joined  to,  at  least  when  there  is 
enough  and  as  good  left  in  common  for  others." 

If  inclined  to  cavil,  one  might  in  reply  to  this  observe, 
that  as,1according  to  the  premises,  "the  earth  and  all 
inferior  creatures  "  —  all  things,  in  fact,  that  the  earth 
produces  —  are  "common  to  all  men,"  the  consent  of  all 
men  must  be  obtained  before  any  article  can  be  equi- 
tably "removed  from  the  common  state  nature  hath 
placed  it  in."  It  might  be  argued  that  the  real  question 
is  overlooked,  when  it  is  said,  that,  by  gathering  any 
natural  product,  a  man  "  hath  mixed  his  labor  with  it, 
and  joined  to  it  something  that  is  his  own,  and  thereby 
made  it  his  property  ;  "  for  that  the  point  to  be  debated 
is,  whether  he  had  any  right  to  gather,  or  mix  his  labor 
with  that,  which,  by  the  hypothesis,  previously  belonged 
to  mankind  at  large.  The  reasoning  used  in  the  last 
chapter  to  prove  that  no  amount  of  labor,  bestowed  by 
an  individual  upon  a  part  of  the  earth's  surface,  can  nul- 
lify the  title  of  society  to  that  part,  might  be  similarly 
employed  to  show  that  no  one  can,  by  the  mere  act  of 
appropriating  to  himself  any  wild  unclaimed  animal  or 
fruit,  supersede  the  joint  claims  of  other  men  to  it.  It 
may  be  quite  true  that  the  labor  a  man  expends  in 
catching  or  gathering,  gives  him  a  better  right  to  the 
thing  caught  or  gathered,  than  any  one  other  man  ;  but 
the  question  at  issue  is,  whether  by  labor  so  expended, 
he  has  made  his  right  to  the  thing  caught  or  gathered, 
greater  than  the  pre-existing  rights  of  all  other  men  put 


34  DECLAEATIOIsr. 

together.  And  unless  he  can  prove  that  he  has  done  this, 
his  title  to  possession  cannot  be  admitted  as  a  matter  of 
right,  but  can  be  conceded  only  on  the  ground  of  con- 
venience. 

Further  difficulties  are  suggested  by  the  qualification, 
that  the  claim  to  any  article  of  property  thus  obtained, 
is  valid  only  "  when  there  is  enough  and  as  good  left  in 
common  for  others."  A  condition  like  this  gives  birth 
to  such  a  host  of  queries,  doubts,  and  limitations,  as 
practically  to  neutralize  the  general  proposition  entirely. 
It  may  be  asked,  for  example  —  How  is  it  to  be  known 
that  enough  is  "left  in  common  for  others"  ?  Who  can 
determine  whether  what  remains  is  "as  good"  as  what 
is  taken  ?  How  if  the  remnant  is  less  accessible?  If 
there  is  not  enough  "  left  in  common  for  others,"  how 
must  the  right  of  appropriation  be  exercised  ?  Why,  in 
such  case,  does  the  mixing  of  labor  with  the  acquired 
object,  cease  to  "exclude  the  common  right  of  other 
men  "  ?  Supposing  enough  to  be  attainable,  but  not  all 
equally  good,  by  what  rule  must  each  man  choose  ?  Out 
of  which  inquisition  it  seems  impossible  to  liberate  the 
alleged  right,  without  such  mutilations  as  to  render  it, 
in  an  ethical  point  of  view,  entirely  valueless. 

Thus,  as  already  hinted,  we  find,  that  the  circum-' 
stances  of  savage  life,  render  the  principles  of  abstract 
morality  inapplicable ;  for  it  is  impossiljle,  under  ante- 
social  conditions,  to  determine  the  rightness  or  wrong- 
ness  of  certain  actions  by  an  exact  measurement  of  the 
amount  of  freedom  assumed  by  the  parties  concerned. 
We  must  not  expect,  therefore,  that  the  right  of  prop- 
erty can  be  satisfactorily  based  upon  the  premises  afforded 
by  such  a  state  of  existence. 

§  2.  But,  under  the  system  of  land-tenure  pointed 
out  in  the  last  chapter,  as  the  only  one  that  is  consistent 
with  the  equal  claims  of  all  men  to  the  use  of  the  earth, 
these  difficulties  disappear ;  and  the  right  of  property 
obtains  a  legitimate  foundation.  We  have  seen  that, 
without  any  infraction  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  an 
individual  may  lease  from  society  a  given  surface  of  soil, 
by  agreeing  to  pay  in  return  a  stated  amount  of  the  pro- 
duce he  obtains  from  that  soil.  We  found  that,  in  doing 
this,  he  does  no  more  than  what  every  other  man  is 


"  SOCIAL  STATICS  "  —  THE  KIGHT  OF  PROPERTY.    35 

equally  free  with  himself  to  do  —  that  each  has  the  same 
power  with  himself  to  become  the  tenant  —  and  that  the 
rent  he  pays  accrues  alike  to  all.  Having  thus  hired  a 
tract  of  land  from  his  fellow-men,  for  a  given  period, 
for  understood  purposes,  and  on  specified  terms  —  hav- 
ing thus  obtained,  for  a  time,  the  exclusive  use  of  that 
land  by  a  definite  agreement  with  its  owners,  it  is  mani- 
fest that  an  individual  may,  without  any  infringement 
of  the  rights  of  others,  appropriate  to  himself  that  por- 
tion of  produce  which  remains  after  he  has  paid  to  man- 
kind the  promised  rent.  He  has  now,  to  use  Locke's 
expression,  "  mixed  his  labor  with  "  certain  products  of 
the  earth ;  and  his  claim  to  them  is  in  this  case  valid, 
because  he  obtained  the  consent  of  society  before  so  ex- 
pending his  labor;  and  having  fulfilled  the  condition 
which  society  imposed  in  giving  that  consent  —  the  pay- 
ment of  rent  —  society,  to  fulfil  its  part  of  the  agree- 
ment, must  acknowledge  his  title  to  that  surplus  which 
remains  after  the  rent  has  been  paid.  "Provided  you 
deliver  to  us  a  stated  share  of  the  produce  which  by  culti- 
vation you  can  obtain  from  this  piece  of  land,  we  give 
you  the  exclusive  use  of  the  remainder  of  that  produce  : " 
these  are  the  words  of  the  contract ;  and  in  virtue  of 
this  contract,  the  tenant  may  equitably  claim  the  sup- 
plementary share  as  his  private  property  :  may  so  claim 
it  without  any  disobedience  to  the  law  of  equal  free- 
dom ;  and  has  therefore  a  right  so  to  claim  it. 

Any  doubt  that  may  be  felt  as  to  the  fact  that  this  is 
a  logical  deduction  from  our  first  principle,  that  every 
man  has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills  provided  he  in- 
fringes not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other  man,  may  be 
readily  cleared  up  by  comparing  the  respective  degrees 
of  freedom  assumed  in  such  a  case  by  the  occupier  and 
the  members  of  society  with  whom  he  bargains.  As 
was  shown  in  the  preceding  chapter,  if  the  public  alto- 
gether deprive  any  individual  of  the  use  of  the  earth, 
they  allow  him  less  liberty  than  they  themselves  claim ; 
and  by  so  breaking  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  commit  a 
wrong.  If,  conversely,  an  individual  usurps  a  given 
portion  of  the  earth,  to  which,  as  we  have  seen,  all  other 
men  have  as  good  a  title  as  himself,  he  breaks  the  law  by 
assuming  more  liberty  than  the  rest.  But  when  an  in- 
dividual holds  land  as  a  tenant  of  society,  a  balance  is 


36  decla'ration. 

maintoined  between  these  extremes,  and  the  claims  of 
both  parties  are  respected.  A  price  is  paid  by  the  one, 
for  a  certain  privilege  granted  by  the  other.  By  the 
fact  of  the  agreement  being  made,  it  is  shown  that  such 
price  and  privilege  are  considered  to  be  equivalents. 
The  lessor  and  the  lessee  have  both,  within  the  pre- 
scribed limits,  done  that  which  they  willed :  the  one  in 
letting  a  certain  holding  for  a  specified  sum;  the  other 
in  agreeing  to  give  tliat  sum.  And  so  long  as  tliis  con- 
tract remains  intact,  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  duly 
observed.  If,  however,  any  of  the  prescribed  conditions 
be  not  fulfilled,  the  law  is  necessarily  broken,  and  the 
parties  are  involved  in  one  of  the  predicaments  above 
named.  If  the  tenant  refuses  to  pay  the  rent,  then  he 
tacitly  lays  claim  to  the  exclusive  use  and  benefit  of  the 
land  he  occupies  —  practically  asserts  that  he  is  the  sole 
owner  of  its  produce ;  and  consequently  violates  the 
law,  by  assuming  a  greater  share  of  freedom  than  the 
rest  of  mankind.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  society  take 
from  the  tenant  that  portion  of  the  fruits  obtained  by  the 
culture  of  his  farm  which  remains  with  him  after  the 
payment  of  rent,  they  virtually  deny  him  the  use  of 
the  earth  entirely  (for  by  the  use  of  the  earth  we  mean 
the  use  of  its  products),  and  in  so  doing,  claim  for  them- 
selves a  greater  share  of  liberty  than  they  allow  him. 
Clearly,  therefore,  this  surplus  produce  equitably  re- 
mains with  the  tenant :  society  cannot  take  it  without 
trespassing  upon  his  freedom ;  lie  can  take  it  without 
trespassing  on  the  freedom  of  society.  And  as,  accord- 
ing to  the  law,  he  is  free  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided 
he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other,  he  is 
free  to  take  possession  of  such  surplus  as  his  property. 

§  3.  The  doctrine  that  all  men  have  equal  rights  to 
the  use  of  the  earth,  does  indeed,  at  first  sight,  seem  to 
countenance  a  species  of  social  organization  at  variance 
with  that  from  which  the  right  of  property  has  just 
been  deduced;  an  organization,  namely,  in  which  the 
public,  instead  of  letting  out  the  land  to  individual 
members  of  their  body,  shall  retain  it  in  their  own 
hands  ;  cultivate  it  by  joint-stock  agency  ;  and  share  the 
produce :  in  fact,  what  is  usually  termed  Socialism  or 
Communism. 


"SOCIAL  statics" — THE  EIGHT  OF  PROPERTY.    37 

Plausible  though  it  may  be,  such  a  scheme  is  not  capa- 
ble of  realization  in  strict  conformity  with  the  moral 
law.  Of  the  two  forms  under  which  it  may  be  pre- 
sented, the  one  is  ethically  imperfect;  and  the  other, 
although  correct  in  theory,  is  impracticable. 

Thus,  if  an  equal  portion  of  the  earth's  produce  is 
awarded  to  every  man,  irrespective  of  the  amount  or 
quality  of  the  labor  he  has  contributed  toward  the 
obtainment  of  that  produce,  a  breach  of  equity  is  com- 
mitted. Our  first  principle  requires,  not  that  all  shall 
have  like  shares  of  the  things  which  minister  to  the 
gratification  of  the  faculties,  but  that  all  shall  have  like 
freedom  to  pursue  those  things  —  shall  have  like  scope. 
It  is  one  thing  to  give  to  each  an  opportunity  of  acquir- 
ing the  objects  he  desires ;  it  is  another,  and  quite  a  dif- 
ferent thing,  to  give  the  objects  themselves,  no  matter 
whether  due  endeavor  has  or  has  not  been  made  to 
obtain  them.  The  one  we  have  seen  to  be  the  primary 
law  of  the  Divine  scheme  ;  the  other,  by  interfering 
with  the  ordained  connection  between  desire  and  gratifi- 
cation, shows  its  disagreement  with  that  scheme.  Nay 
more,  it  necessitates  an  absolute  violation  of  the  prin- 
ciple of  equal  freedom.  For  when  we  assert  the  entire 
liberty  of  each,  bounded  only  by  the  like  liberty  of  all, 
we  assert  that  each  is  free  to  do  whatever  his  desires 
dictate,  within  the  prescribed  limits  —  that  each  is  free, 
therefore,  to  claim  for  himself  all  those  gratifications, 
and  sources  of  gratification,  attainable  by  him  within 
those  limits  —  all  those  gratifications,  and  sources  of 
gratification,  which  he  can  procure  without  trespassing 
upon  the  spheres  of  action  of  his  neighbors.  If,  there- 
fore, out  of  many  starting  with  like  fields  of  activity, 
one  obtains,  by  his  greater  strength,  greater  ingenuity, 
or  greater  application,  more  gratification  and  sources  of 
gratification  than  the  rest,  and  does  this  without  in  any 
way  trenching  upon  the  equal  freedom  of  the  rest,  the 
moral  law  assigns  him  an  exclusive  right  to  all  those 
extra  gratifications  and  sources  of  gratification  ;  nor  can 
the  rest  take  from  him  without  claiming  for  themselves 
greater  liberty  of  action  than  he  claims,  and  thereby 
violating  that  law.  Whence  it  follows,  that  an  equal 
apportionment  of  the  fruits  of  the  earth  amongst  all,  is 
not  consistent  with  pure  justice. 


38  DECLAEATION. 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  each  is  to  have  allotted  to  him  a 
share  of  produce  proportionate  to  the  degree  in  which 
ho  has  aided  production,  the  proposal,  whilst  it  is 
abstractedly  just,  is  no  longer  practicable.  Were  all 
men  cultivators  of  the  soil,  it  would  perhaps  be  possible 
to  form  an  approximate  estimate  of  their  several  claims. 
But  to  ascertain  the  respective  amounts  of  help  given 
by  different  kinds  of  mental  and  bodily  laborers,  toward 
procuring  the  general  stock  of  the  necessaries  of  life,  is 
an  utter  impossibility.  We  have  no  means  of  making 
such  a  division  save  that  afforded  by  the  law  of  supply 
and  demand,  and  this  means  the  hypothesis  excludes.^ 

§  4.  An  argument  fatal  to  the  communist  theory,  is 
suggested  by  the  fact,  that  a  desire  for  property  is  one 
of  the  elements  of  our  nature.  Kepeated  allusion  has 
been  made  to  the  admitted  truth,  that  acquisitiveness  is 
an  unreasoning  impulse  quite  distinct  from  the  desires 
whose  gratifications  property  secures  —  an  impulse  that 
is  often  obeyed  at  the  expense  of  those  desires.  And  if 
a  propensity  to  personal  acquisition  be  really  a  com- 
ponent of  man's  constitution,  then  that  cannot  be  a  right 
form  of  society  which  affords  it  no  scope.  Socialists  do 
indeed  allege  that  private  appropriation  is  an  abuse  of 
this  propensity,  whose  normal  function,  they  say,  is  to 
impel  us  to  accumulate  for  the  benefit  of  the  public  at 
large.  But  in  thus  attempting  to  escape  from  one  diffi- 
culty, they  do  but  entangle  themselves  in  another.  Such 
an  explanation  overlooks  the  fact  that  the  use  and  abuse 
of  a  faculty  (whatever  the  etymology  of  the  words  may 
imply)  differ  only  in  decree ;  whereas  their  assumption 
is,  that  they  differ  in  kind.  Gluttony  is  an  abuse  of  the 
desire  for  food;  timidity,  an  abuse  of  the  feeling  which 
in  moderation  produces  prudence  ;  servility,  an  abuse  of 
the  sentiment  that  generates  respect ;  obstinacy,  of  that 
from  which  firmness  springs :  in  all  of  which  cases  we 
find  that  the  legitimate  manifestations  differ  from  the 
illegitimate  ones,  merely  in  quantity,  and  not  in  quality. 
So  also  with  the  instinct  of  accumulation.  It  may  be 
quite  true  that  its  dictates  have  been,  and  still  are,  fol- 
lowed to  an  absurd  excess ;  but  it  is  also  true  that  no 

1  Tliese  inferences  do  not  at  M  militate  against  joint-stock  systems  of  pro- 
duction and  living,  wliicti  are  in  all  probability  what  Socialism  propliesieg. 


"  SOCIAL  STATICS  "  —  THE  RIGHT  OF  PROPERTY.    39 

change  in  the  state  of  society  will  alter  its  nature  and 
its  office.  To  whatever  extent  nioderated,  it  must  still 
be  a  desire  for  personal  acquisition.  Whence  it  follows 
that  a  system  affording  opportunity  for  its  exercise  must 
ever  be  retained ;  which  means,  that  the  system  of  pri- 
vate property  must  be  retained  ;  and  this  presupposes 
a  right  of  private  property,  for  by  right  we  mean  that 
which  harmonizes  with,  the  human  constitution  as 
divinely  ordained. 

§  5.  There  is,  however,  a  still  more  awkward  dilemma 
into  which  M.  Proudhon  and  his  party  betray  them- 
selves. For  if,  as  they  assert,  "  all  property  is  robbery  " 
—  if  no  one  can  equitably  become  the  exclusive  pos- 
sessor of  any  article  —  or  as  we  say,  obtain  a  right  to  it, 
then,  amongst  other  consequences,  it  follows,  that  a  man 
can  have  no  right  to  the  things  he  consumes  for  food. 
And  if  these  are  not  his  before  eating  them,  how  can 
they  become  his  at  all  ?  As  Locke  asks,  "  when  do  they 
begin  to  be  his  ?  when  he  digests  ?  or  when  he  eats  ?  or 
when  he  boils  ?  or  when  he  brings  them  home  ?  "  If  no 
previous  acts  can  make  them  his  property,  neither  can 
any  process  of  assimilation  do  it ;  not  even  their  absorp- 
tion into  the  tissues.  Wherefore,  pursuing  the  idea,  we 
arrive  at  the  curious  conclusion,  that  as  the  whole  of  his 
bones,  muscles,  skin,  etc.,  have  been  thus  built  up  from 
nutriment  not  belonging  to  him,  a  man  has  no  property 
in  his  own  flesh  and  blood  —  can  have  no  valid  title  to 
himself — has  no  more  claim  to  his  own  limbs  than  he 
has  to  the  limbs  of  another  —  and  has  as  good  a  right  to 
his  neighbor's  body  as  to  his  own  !  Did  we  exist  after 
the  same  fashion  as  those  compound  polyps,  in  which  a 
number  of  individuals  are  based  upon  a  living  trunk 
common  to  them  all,  such  a  theory  would  be  rational 
enough.  But  until  Communism  can  be  carried  to  that 
extent,  it  will  be  best  to  stand  by  the  old  doctrine. 

§  6.     Further   argument  appears  to    be   unnecessary. 

We  have  seen  that  the  right  of  property  is  deducible 
from  the  law  of  equal  freedom — that  it  is  presupposed 
by  the  human  constitution  —  and  that  its  denial  involves 
absurdities. 

Were  it  not  that  we  shall  frequently  have  to  refer  to 


40  DECLARATIOIsr. 

the  fact  hereafter,  it  would  be  scarcely  needful  to  show 
that  the  taking  away  another's  property  is  an  infringe- 
ment of  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  and  is  therefore 
wrong.  If  A  appropriates  to  himself  something  belong- 
ing to  B,  one  of  two  things  must  take  place :  either  B 
does  the  like  to  A,  or  he  does  not.  If  A  has  no  prop- 
erty, or  if  his  property  is  inaccessible  to  B,  B  has  evi- 
dently no  opportunity  of  exercising  equal  freedom  with 
A,  by  claiming  from  him  something  of  like  value;  and 
A  has  therefore  assumed  a  greater  share  of  freedom  than 
he  allows  B,  and  has  broken  the  law.  If  again,  A's 
property  is  open  to  B,  and  A  permits  B  to  use  like  free- 
dom with  himself  by  taking  an  equivalent,  there  is  no 
violation  of  the  law ;  and  the  affair  practically  becomes 
one  of  barter.  But  such  a  transaction  will  never  take 
place  save  in  theory ;  for  A  has  no  motive  to  appropriate 
B's  property  with  the  intention  of  letting  B  take  an 
equivalent :  seeing  that  if  he  really  means  to  let  B  have 
what  B  thinks  an  equivalent,  he  will  prefer  to  make  the 
exchange  by  consent  in  the  ordinary  way.  The  only 
case  simulating  this,  is  one  in  which  A  takes  from  B  a 
thing  that  B  does  not  wish  to  part  with  ;  that  is,  a  thing 
for  which  A  can  give  B  nothing  that  B  thinks  an  equiv- 
alent ;  and  as  the  amount  of  gratification  which  B  has 
in  the  possession  of  this  thing,  is  the  measure  of  its 
value  to  him,  it  follows  that  if  A  cannot  give  B  a  thing 
which  affords  B  equal  gratification,  or  in  other  words 
what  he  thinks  an  equivalent,  then  A  has  taken  from 
B  what  affords  A  satisfaction,  but  does  not  return  to  B 
what  affords  B  satisfaction ;  and  has  therefore  broken 
the  law  by  assuming  the  greater  share  of  freedom. 
Wherefore  we  find  it  to  be  a  logical  deduction  from  the 
law  of  equal  freedom,  that  no  man  can  rightfully  take 
property  from  another  against  his  will. 

There  is  in  this,  it  will  be  observed,  no  modification 
whatever  of  the  strenuous  assertion  in  Chapter  IX. 
of  the  equal,  natural  and  inalienable  right  of  all  men 
to  the  use  of  land.  On  the  contrary,  so  strongly, 
so  uncompromisingl}^  does  Mr.  Sjjencer  insist  on  the 
ethical  invalidity  of  private  property  in  land  that 


"  SOCIAL  STATICS  "  —  THE  RIGHT  OF  PROPERTY.    41 

lie  makes  the  formal  consent  of  the  community  and 
the  payment  of  rent  to  it  a  condition  precedent  to  the 
individual  right  of  property  in  things  produced  by 
labor.  And,  since  no  formal  consent  of  this  kind 
can  be  given  until  society  has  been  well  organized,  he 
even  goes  to  the  length  of  denying  that  there  can 
be  any  full  right  of  property,  or,  indeed,  any  applica- 
tion of  the  principles  of  abstract  morality,  iu  any 
social  condition  lower  than  the  civilized. 
In  brief,  the  argument  of  this  chapter  is  — 

1.  That  the  right  of  the  individual  to  his  labor 
does  not  give  individual  property  in  the  product 
of  labor,  because  labor  can  produce  only  by  using 
land,  which  does  not  belong  to  any  individual,  but 
to  all. 

2.  But  under  the  system  of  land-tenure  previously 
set  forth  as  the  only  just  one,  in  which  the  organized 
society  assigns  the  use  of  a  portion  of  land  to  an  in- 
dividual and  collects  rent  from  him  for  it,  the  con- 
ditions of  the  equal  liberty  of  all  are  complied  with, 
and  the  individual  acquires  a  right  of  property  in 
what  remains  of  the  product  of  his  labor  after  paying 
rent. 

3.  This  system,  under  which  the  social  organization 
would  let  land  to  individuals  and  collect  rent  from 
them,  does  not  countenance  the  system  under  which 
it  would  carry  on  production  and  divide  the  product 
among  its  members,  since,  the  powers  and  application 
of  men  being  different,  this  would  give  to  some  more 
than  they  are  entitled  to,  and  to  others  less. 

4.  This  communistic  or  socialistic  system  is  also 
condemned  by  the  natural  desire  to  acquire  individual 
property. 


42  DECLARATION. 

6.  The  denial  of  individual  property  may  be 
broil oflit  into  the  awkward  dilemma  of  a  denial  of 
the  right  of  the  individual  to  himself. 

6.  The  right  of  property  having  thus  been  estab- 
lished, the  appropriation  by  one  of  property  belonging 
to  another  is  a  denial  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

ME.    spencer's   confusion  AS   TO   EIGHTS. 

My  purpose  in  quoting  Chapter  X.  is  to  show  what 
were  the  views  on  the  land  question  expressed  by 
Mr.  Spencer  in  "  Social  Statics."  It  may,  however, 
be  worth  while,  in  passing,  to  clear  up  the  confusion 
in  which  he  here  entangles  the  right  to  the  products 
of  labor  with  the  right  to  land.  This  confusion  he 
has  not  yet  escaped  from,  as  it  is  still  to  be  seen  in 
his  latest  book,  "  Justice,"  where,  though  evidently 
anxious  to  minimize  the  land  question,  he  still  as- 
sumes that  to  justify  the  right  of  property  in  things 
produced  from  nature  the  consent  of  all  men  must  be 
obtained  or  inferred. 

Nor  is  it  the  right  of  property  alone  that  is 
thus  confused.  Mr.  Spencer  really  puts  himself 
in  the  same  dilemma  that,  in  Section  5,  he  pro- 
poses to  Proudhon  ;  for  if,  as  in  this  chapter  he 
asserts,  no  one  can  equitably  become  the  exclusive 
possessor  of  any  natural  substance  or  product 
until  the  joint  rights  of  all  the  rest  of  mankind 
have  been  made  over  to  him  by  some  species  of 
quit  claim  — 

.  Then  amongst  other  consequences,  it  follows  that  a 
man  can  have  no  right  to  the  things  he  consumes  for 
food.     And  if  these  are  not  his  before  eating  them,  how 


44  DECLARATION. 

can  they  become  Lis  at  all  ?  As  Locke  asks,  "when  do 
they  begin  to  be  his  ?  when  he  digests  ?  or  when  he 
eats  ?  or  when  he  boils  ?  or  when  he  brings  them 
home  ?  "  If  no  previous  acts  can  make  them  his  prop- 
erty, neither  can  any  process  of  assimilation  do  it ;  not 
even  in  their  absorption  into  the  tissues.  Wherefore, 
pursuing  the  idea,  we  arrive  at  the  curious  conclusion, 
that,  as  the  whole  of  his  bones,  muscles,  skin,  etc.,  have 
thus  been  built  up  from  nutriment  not  belonging  to 
him,  a  man  has  no  property  in  himself  —  has  no  more 
claim  to  his  own  limbs  than  he  has  to  the  limbs  of 
another  —  and  has  as  good  a  right  to  his  neighbor's 
body  as  to  his  own. 

The  fact  is,  that  without  noticing  the  change,  Mr. 
Spencer  has  dropped  the  idea  of  equal  rights  to  land, 
and  taken  up  in  its  stead  a  different  idea  —  that  of 
joint  rights  to  land.  That  there  is  a  difference  may 
be  seen  at  once.  For  joint  rights  may  be  and  often 
are  unequal  rights. 

The  matter  is  an  inij^ortant  one,  as  it  is  the  source 
of  a  great  deal  of  popular  confusion.     liCt  me,  there-- 
fore,  explain  it  fully. 

When  men  have  equal  rights  to  a  thing,  as  for 
instance,  to  the  rooms  and  appurtenances  of  a  club  of 
which  they  are  members,  each  has  a  right  to  use  all 
or  any  part  of  the  thing  tliat  no  other  one  of  them  is 
using.  It  is  only  where  there  is  use  or  some  indica- 
tion of  use  by  one  of  the  others  that  even  politeness 
dictates  such  a  phrase  as  "  Allow  me  !  "  or  "  If  you 
please ! " 

But  where  men  have  joint  rights  to  a  thing,  as  for 
instance,  to  a  sum  of  money  held  to  their  joint  credit, 
then  the  consent  of  all  the  others  is  required  for  the 
use  of  the  thing  or  of  any  part  of  it,  by  any  one. of 
them. 


MR.   spencer's   COXFTJSION   AS   TO   RIGHTS.      45 

Now,  the  rights  of  men  to  the  use  of  hind  are  not 
joint  rights  :  they  are  equal  rights. 

Were  there  only  one  man  on  earth,  he  would  have 
a  right  to  the  use  of  the  whole  earth  or  any  part  of 
the  earth. 

When  there  is  more  than  one  man  on  earth,  the 
right  to  the  use  of  land  that  any  one  of  them  would 
have,  were  he  alone,  is  not  abrogated:  it  is  only  lim- 
ited. The  right  of  each  to  the  use  of  land  is  still  a 
direct,  original  riglit,  which  lie  holds  of  himself,  and 
not  by  the  gift  or  consent  of  the  others  ;  but  it  has 
become  limited  by  the  similar  rights  of  the  others, 
and  is  therefore  an  equal  right.  His  riglit  to  use  the 
earth  still  continues ;  but  it  has  become,  by  reason  of 
this  limitation,  not  an  absolute  right  to  use  any  part 
of  the  earth,  but  (1)  an  absolute  right  to  use  any 
part  of  the  earth  as  to  which  his  use  does  not  conflict 
with  the  equal  rights  of  others  (f.  e.,  which  no  one 
else  wants  to  use  at  the  same  time),  and  (2)  a  co-equal 
right  to  the  use  of  any  part  of  the  earth  which  he 
and  others  may  want  to  use  at  the  same  time. 

It  is,  thus,  only  where  two  or  more  men  want  to 
use  the  same  land  at  the  same  time  that  equal  rights 
to  the  use  of  land  come  in  conflict,  and  the  adjust- 
ment of  society  becomes  necessaiy. 

If  we  keep  this  idea  of  equal  rights  in  mind  —  the 
idea,  namely,  that  the  rights  are  the  first  thing,  and 
the  equality  merely  their  limitation  —  we  shall  have 
no  diificulty.  It  is  through  forgetting  this  that  Mr. 
Spencer  has  been  led  into  confusion. 

In  Chapter  IX.,  "The  Right  to  the  Use  of  the 
Earth,"  he  correctly  apprehends  and  states  the  right 
to  the  use  of  land  as  an  equal  right.     He  says : 


46  DECLARATION. 

Each  of  them  is  free  to  use  the  earth  for  the  satisfac- 
tion of  his  wants, 

Provided  he  allows  all  others  the  same  liberty. 

Here,  in  the  first  clause,  is  the  primary  right ;  in 
the  second  clause,  the  proviso  or  limitation. 

But  in  the  next  chapter,  "  The  Right  of  Property," 
he  has,  seemingly  without  noticing  it  himself,  substi- 
tuted for  the  idea  of  equal  rights  to  land  the  idea  of 
joint  rights  to  land.     He  says  (Section  1)  : 

No  amount  of  labor  bestowed  by  an  individual  upon  a 
part  of  the  earth's  surface  can  nullify  the  title  of  society 
to  that  part,  ...  no  one  can,  by  the  mere  act  of  appro- 
priating to  himself  any  wild,  unclaimed  animal  or  fruit, 
supersede  the  joint  claims  of  other  men  to  it.  It  may  be 
quite  true  that  the  labor  a  man  expends  in  catching  or 
gathering,  gives  him  a  better  right  to  the  thing  caught 
or  gathered,  than  any  one  other  man  ;  but  the  question 
at  issue  is,  whether  by  labor  so  expended  he  has  made 
his  right  to  the  thing  caught  or  gathered,  greater  than 
the  pre-existing  rights  of  all  other  men  put  together. 
And  unless  he  can  prove  that  he  has  done  this,  his  title 
to  possession  cannot  be  admitted  as  a  matter  of  riffht, 
but  can  be  conceded  only  on  the  ground  of  convenience. 

Here  the  primary  right  —  the  right  by  which  "  each 
of  them  is  free  to  use  the  earth  for  the  satisfaction 
of  his  wants  "  —  has  been  dropped  out  of  sight,  and 
the  mere  proviso  has  been  swelled  into  the  importance 
of  the  primary  right,  and  has  taken  its  place. 

What  Mr.  Spencer  here  asserts,  without  noticing 
his  change  of  position,  is  not  that  the  rights  of  men 
to  the  use  of  land  are  equal  rights,  but  that  they  are 
joint  rights.  And,  from  this  careless  shifting  of 
ground,  he  is  led,  not  only  into  hypercritical  ques- 
tioning of  Locke's  derivation  of  the  right  of  property, 


MR.    spencer's    confusion   AS   TO    RIGHTS.       47 

but  into  the  assumption  that  a  man  can  have  no  right 
to  the  wild  berries  he  has  gathered  on  an  untrodden 
prairie,  unless  he  can  prove  the  consent  of  all  other 
men  to  his  takingf  them.  This  reductio  ad  absurdum 
is  a  deduction  from  the  idea  of  joint  rights  to  land, 
whereas  the  deduction  from  the  equality  of  rights  to 
land  would  be  that  under  such  circumstances  a  man 
would  have  a  right  to  take  all  the  berries  he  wanted, 
and  that  all  other  men  together  would  have  no  ri^ht 
to  forbid  him.  Indeed,  so  great  is  Mr.  Spencer's  con- 
fusion, and  so  utterly  unable  does  he  become  to  as- 
sume a  clear  and  indis2:)utable  right  of  property,  that 
he  has  to  cut  the  knot  into  which  he  has  tangled  the 
subject,  and  finds  no  escape  but  in  the  preposterous 
declaration  that  the  dictates  of  ethics  have  no  appli- 
cation to,  and  do  not  exist  in,  any  social  state  except 
that  of  the  highest  civilization. 

Locke  was  not  in  error.  The  right  of  property 
in  things  produced  by  labor  —  and  this  is  the  only 
true  right  of  property — s]3rings  directly  from  the 
right  of  the  individual  to  himself,  or  as  Locke  ex- 
presses it,  from  his  "  property  in  his  own  person." 
It  is  as  clear  and  has  as  fully  the  sanction  of  equity 
in  any  savage  state  as  in  the  most  elaborate  civiliza- 
tion. Labor  can,  of  course,  produce  nothing  Avitliout 
land ;  but  the  right  to  the  use  of  land  is  a  primary 
individual  right,  not  springing  from  society,  or  de- 
pending on  the  consent  of  society,  either  expressed 
or  implied,  but  inhering  in  the  individual,  and  result- 
ing from  his  presence  in  the  world.  Men  must  have 
rights  before  they  can  have  equal  rights.  Each  man 
has  a  right  to  use  the  world  because  he  is  here  and 
wants  to  use  the  world.     The  equality  of  this  right 


48  DECLAIIATION. 

is  merely  a  limitation  arising  from  the  presence  of 
others  with  like  rights.  Society,  in  other  words,  does 
not  grant,  and  cannot  equitably  withhold  from  any 
individual,  the  right  to  the  use  of  land.  That  right 
exists  before  society  and  independently  of  society, 
belonging  at  birth  to  each  individual,  and  ceasing 
only  with  his  death.  Society  itself  has  no  original 
right  to  the  use  of  land.  What  right  it  has  with 
regard  to  the  use  of  land  is  simply  that  which  is 
derived  from  and  is  necessary  to  the  determination 
of  the  rights  of  the  individuals  who  compose  it. 
That  is  to  sa}^  the  function  of  society  with  regard  to 
the  use  of  land  only  begins  where  individual  rights 
clash,  and  is  to  secure  equality  between  these  clash- 
ing rights  of  individuals. 

What  Locke  meant,  or  at  least  the  expression  that 
will  give  full  and  practical  form  to  his  idea,  is  simply 
this :  That  the  equal  right  to  life  involves  the  equal 
right  to  the  use  of  natural  materials ;  that,  conse- 
quently, any  one  has  a  right  to  the  use  of  such  natural 
opportunities  as  may  not  be  wanted  by  any  one  else ; 
and  that  the  result  of  his  labor,  so  expended,  does  of 
right  become  his  individual  property  against  all  the 
world.  For,  wliere  one  man  wants  to  use  a  natural 
opportunity  that  no  one  else  wants  to  use,  he  has  a 
right  to  do  so,  which  springs  from  and  is  attested  by 
the  fact  of  his  existence.  This  is  an  absolute,  un- 
limited right,  so  long  and  in  so  far  as  no  one  else 
wants  to  use  the  same  natural  opportunity.  Then, 
but  not  till  then,  it  becomes  limited  by  the  similar 
rights  of  others.  Thus  no  question  of  the  right  of 
any  one  to  use  any  natural  opportunity  can  arise 
until   more   than   one    man  wants   to   use  the  same 


MR.   spencer's   confusion   AS  TO   RIGHTS.       49 

natural  opportunity.  It  is  only  then  that  any 
question  of  this  right,  any  need  for  the  action  of 
society  in  the  adjustment  of  equal  rights  to  land, 
can  come  up. 

Thus,  instead  of  there  being  no  right  of  property 
until  society  has  so  far  developed  that  all  land  has 
been  properly  appraised  and  rented  for  terms  of 
years,  an  absolute  right  of  property  in  the  things 
produced  by  labor  exists  from  the  beginning  —  is 
coeval  with  the  existence  of  man. 

In  the  right  of  each  man  to  himself,  and  his  right 
to  use  the  world,  lies  the  sure  basis  of  the  right  of 
property.  This  Locke  saw  —  just  as  the  first  man 
must  have  seen  it.  But  Mr.  Spencer,  confused  by 
a  careless  substitution  of  terms,  has  lost  his  grasp  on 
the  right  of  property  and  has  never  since  recovered  it. 

Getting  rid  of  the  idea  of  joint  rights  we  see  that 
the  task  of  securing,  in  an  advanced  and  complex 
civilization,  the  equal  rights  of  all  to  the  use  of  land 
is  much  simpler  and  easier  than  Mr.  Spencer  and  the 
land  nationalizatiouists  suppose  ;  that  it  is  not  neces- 
sary for  society  to  take  land  and  rent  it  out.  For  so 
long  as  only  one  man  wants  to  use  a  natural  opportu- 
nity it  has  no  value ;  but  as  soon  as  two  or  more  want 
to  use  the  same  natural  opportunity,  a  value  arises. 
Hence,  any  question  as  to  the  adjustment  of  equal 
rights  to  the  use  of  land  occurs  only  as  to  valuable 
land  ;  that  is  to  say,  land  that  has  a  value  irrespective 
of  the  value  of  any  improvements  in  or  on  it.  As  to 
land  that  has  no  value,  or  to  use  the  economic  phrase, 
bears  no  rent,  whoever  may  choose  to  use  it  has  not 
only  an  equitable  title  to  all  that  his  labor  may  pro- 
duce from  it,  but  society  cannot  justly  call  on  him 


50  DECLARATION. 

for  any  payment  for  the  use  of  it.  As  to  land  that 
has  a  value,  or,  to  use  the  economic  phrase  in  the 
economic  meaning,  bears  rent,  the  principle  of  equal 
freedom  requires  only  that  this  value,  or  economic 
rent,  be  turned  over  to  the  community.  Hence  the 
formal  ajjpropriation  and  renting  out  of  land  by  the 
community  is  not  necessary :  it  is  only  necessary 
that  the  holder  of  valuable  land  should  pay  to  the 
community  an  equivalent  of  the  ground  value,  or  eco- 
nomic rent ;  and  this  can  be  assured  by  the  simple 
means  of  collecting  an  assessment  in  the  form  of  a 
tax  on  the  value  of  land,  irrespective  of  improve- 
ments in  or  on  it. 

In  this  way  all  members  of  the  community  are 
placed  on  equal  terms  with  regard  to  natural  oppor- 
tunities that  offer  greater  advantages  than  those  any 
one  member  of  the  community  is  free  to  use,  and 
are  consequently  sought  by  more  than  one  of  those 
having  equal  rights  to  use  the  land.  And,  since  the 
value  of  land  arises  from  competition  and  is  constantly 
fixed  by  competition,  the  question  of  who  shall  use 
this  superior  land  desired  by  more  than  one  is  virtu- 
ally decided  by  competition,  which  settles  clashing 
individual  desires  by  determining  at  once  both  who 
shall  be  accorded  the  use  of  the  superior  land,  and 
who  will  make  the  most  j)roductive  use  of  it.  In 
this  way  all,  including  the  user  of  the  superior  natural 
opportunity,  obtain  their  equal  shares  of  the  superi- 
ority, by  the  taking  of  its  value  for  their  common 
uses ;  while  all  the  difficulties  of  state  rental  of  land 
and  of  determining  and  settling  for  the  value  of  im- 
provements are  avoided.  This  is  the  single  tax 
system. 


CHAPTER  V. 

MR.   spencer's   confusion   AS  TO  VALUE. 

It  seems  strange  that  a  man  who  has  touched  on 
so  many  branches  of  knowledge,  and  written  so 
largely  on  sociology,  should  even  to  this  time  have 
neglected  the  primary  principles  of  political  economy. 
But  the  failure  to  distinguish  between  equal  rights 
and  joint  rights,  which  has  so  confused  Mr.  Spencer, 
is  allied  witli  a  failure  to  comprehend  the  nature  of 
rent.  In  "  Social  Statics  "  he  assumes  that  all  land 
ought  to  pay  rent  to  the  state,  and  on  this  assump- 
tion, joined  with  and  perhaps  giving  rise  to  his  trans- 
mutation of  equal  rights  into  joint  rights,  he  bases 
important  conclusions  as  to  the  right  of  property. 
In  his  latest  book,  "  Justice,"  he  is  not  only  no  clearer 
in  this  but  shows  plainly  —  what  in  "  Social  Statics  " 
is  only  to  be  surmised^ — his  failure  to  appreciate  the 
nature  of  the  fundamental  economic  concept  —  value. 

Thus,  in  the  chapter  in  "  Justice  "  entitled  "  The 
Right  of  Property,"  he  speaks  (Section  55)  of  weap- 
ons, instruments,  dress  and  decorations  as  "  things  in 
which  the  value  given  by  labor  bears  a  specially  large 
relation  to  the  value  of  the  raw  material,"  and  thus 
continues : 

When  with  such  articles  we  join  huts,  which,  however, 
being  commonly  made  by  the  help  of  fellow  men  who 
receive  reciprocal  aid,  are  thus  less  distinctly  products 


62  DECLARATION. 

of  an  individual's  labor,  we  have  named  about  all  the 
things  in  which,  at  first,  the  worth  given  by  effort  is 
great  in  comparison  with  the  inherent  worth ;  for  the 
inherent  worth  of  the  wild  food  gathered  or  caught  is 
more  obvious  than  the  worth  of  the  effort  spent  in  obtain- 
ing it.  And  this  is  doubtless  the  reason  why,  in  the 
rudest  societies,  the  right  of  property  is  more  definite  in 
respect  of  personal  belongings  than  in  respect  of  other 
things. 

Passing  the  queer  notion  that  things  made  by  two 
or  more  men  are  less  distinctly  products  of  an  indi- 
vidual's labor  than  things  made  by  one  man,  we  have 
here  the  idea  that  there  is  an  inherent  value  in  the 
materials  and  spontaneous  products  of  nature  —  i.e.^ 
land  in  the  economic  category  —  a  value  underived 
from'  labor  and  independent  of  it.  The  slightest 
acquaintance  with  economic  literature,  the  slightest 
attempt  to  analyze  the  meaning  of  the  term,  would 
have  shown  Mr.  Spencer  the  preposterousness  of  this 
idea. 

The  word  "  value "  in  English  speech  has  two 
meanings.  One  is  that  of  usefulness  or  utility,  as 
when  we  speak  of  the  value  of  the  ocean  to  man, 
the  value  of  fresh  air,  the  viiiue  of  the  compass  in 
navigation,  the  value  of  the  stethescope  in  the  diag- 
nosis of  disease,  the  value  of  the  antiseptic  treatment 
in  surgery  ;  or,  when  having  in  mind  the  intrinsic 
merits  of  the  mental  production  itself,  its  quality  of 
usefulness  to  the  reader  or  to  the  public,  we  speak  of 
the  value  of  a  book.  In  this  sense  of  utility  there 
is  inherent  worth  or  intrinsic  value  —  a  quality  or 
qualities  belonging  to  the  thing  itself,  which  give  it 
usefulness  to  man. 

The  other  sense  of  the  word  "value"  —  the  sense 


ME.   spencer's   confusion   AS   TO   VALUE.       53 

in  which  Mr.  Spencer  uses  it  when  he  says  that  the 
value  given  by  labor  bears  a  specially  large  ratio  to 
the  value  of  the  raw  materials,  or  when,  later  on,  he 
substitutes  the  word  "  worth  "  as  synonymous  in  such 
use  for  "  value"  —  is  that  of  exchangeability.  In  this 
sense  value  or  worth  means  not  utility,  not  any 
quality  inhering  in  the  thing  itself,  but  a  quality 
which  gives  to  the  possession  of  a  thing  the  ]30wer  of 
obtaining  other  things  in  return  for  it  or  for  its  use. 
Thus  we  speak  of  the  value  of  gold  as  greater  than 
that  of  iron ;  of  a  book  bound  in  cloth  as  being  more 
valuable  than  a  book  bound  in  paper ;  of  the  v.alue 
of  a  copyright  or  a  patent ;  of  the  lessening  in  the 
value  of  steel  by  the  Bessemer  process,  or  in  that  of 
aluminium  by  the  improvements  in  extraction  now 
going  on. 

Value  in  this  sense  —  the  usual  sense  —  is  purely 
relative.  It  exists  from  and  is  measured  by  the 
power  of  obtaining  things  for  things  by  exchan- 
ging them.  It  is  therefore  absurd  to  speak  in  this 
sense  of  inherent  worth  or  intrinsic  value.  Air  has 
the  intrinsic  quality  of  utility,  or  value  in  use,  to 
the  very  highest  degree;  for  without  an  abundant 
supply  of  it  we  could  not  live  a  minute.  But  air  has 
no  value  whatever  in  the  sense  of  value  in  exchange. 
We  speak  of  a  man  of  worth,  or  a  worthy  man,  when 
we  mean  a  man  whose  inherent  qualities  entitle  him 
to  esteem ;  but,  when  we  speak  of  a  man  who  is 
worth  so  and  so  much,  or  of  a  wealthy  man,  we  speak 
of  him  in  certain  external  relations,  purely  relative, 
which  give  him  the  power  of  obtaining  things  by 
exchange.  A  worthy  man  may  retain  his  worthi- 
ness through  all  changes  of  external  conditions  ;  but 


54  DECLARATION. 

a  wealthy  man  is  in  this  the  creature  of  external  con- 
ditions :  the  same  man,  in  nothing  changed,  may 
through  external  circumstances  be  wealthy  to-day 
and  poverty-stricken  to-morrow. 

Now,  what  gives  to  anything  the  quality  of  ex- 
changeability for  other  things  —  the  quality  of  Avorth 
in  exchange,  or  value  ?  —  for,  having  explained  the 
other  sense  of  the  word  "  value,"  I  will  in  subsequent 
use  confine  it  to  its  common  and  proper  sense,  that  of 
value  in  exchange. 

That  a  thing  has  value,  and  may  be  exchanged  for 
other  things,  is  not  because  of  its  weight,  or  color, 
or  divisibility,  or  any  other  quality  inherent  in  the 
thing  itself.  Nor  3-et  is  it  because  of  its  utility  to 
man.  Utility  is  necessary  to  value,  for  nothing  can 
be  valuable  unless  it  has  the  quality  of  gratifying 
some  physical  or  mental  desire  of  man,  though  it  be 
but  a  fancy  or  whim.  But  utility  of  itself  does  not 
give  value.  Air,  which  has  the  highest  utility,  has 
no  value,  while  diamonds,  which  have  very  little 
utility,  have  great  value. 

If  we  ask  ourselves  the  reason  of  such  variations 
in  the  quality  of  value ;  if  yve  inquire  what  is  the 
attribute  or  condition  concurring  with  the  presence, 
absence,  or  degree  of  value  attaching  to  anything  — 
we  see  that  things  having  some  form  of  utility  or 
desirabilit}^,  are  valuable  or  not  valuable,  as  they  are 
hard  or  easy  to  get.  And,  if  we  ask  further,  we  may 
see  that  with  most  of  the  things  that  have  value  this 
difficulty  or  ease  of  getting  them,  which  determines 
value,  depends  on  the  amount  of  labor  which  must 
be  expended  in  producing  them ;  i.e.,  bringing  them 
into  the  place,  form  and  condition  in  which  they  are 


MR.   spencer's   confusion   AS   TO   VALUE.       55 

desired.  Thus  air,  which  is  of  the  highest  utility, 
since  it  is  at  every  instant  necessary  to  our  existence, 
can  be  had  witliout  hibor.  It  is  the  substance  of 
that  ocean,  enveloping  the  surface  of  the  globe,  in 
which  we  are  constantly  immersed.  So  far  from 
requiring  labor  to  get  it,  it  forces  itself  upon  us, 
requiring  labor,  when  we  are  so  disposed,  to  keep  it 
away.  Hence  air,  in  spite  of  its  high  utility,  has  no 
value.  Large  and  pure  diamonds,  on  the  contrary, 
since  they  are  found  only  in  few  places  and  require 
much  search  and  toil  to  get,  can  be  had  only  with 
great  labor.  Hence,  although  they  have  very  low 
utility,  since  they  gratify  only  the  sense  of  beauty 
and  the  desire  for  ostentation,  they  have  very  high 
value.  Thus  gold,  weight  for  weight,  is  more  valu- 
able than  silver,  and  much  more  valuable  than  iron, 
simply  because  it  requires  on  the  average  more  labor 
to  get  a  given  quantity  of  gold  than  to  get  the  same 
quantity  of  silver,  and  much  more  than  to  get  the 
same  quantity  of  iron. 

That  as  to  such  things  as  these  the  quality  of 
value  is  derived  from  the  labor  required  to  produce 
them ;  and  that,  consequently,  as  to  them  at  least, 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  inherent  value  —  becomes 
clearer  still  when  we  consider  how  their  value  is 
affected  by  the  increase  or  decrease  of  the  require- 
ment for  labor. 

Iron  as  compared  to  gold  used  to  be  much  more 
valuable  than  it  is  now.  Why?  Because  improved 
processes  in  smelting  have  lessened  the  labor  of  pro- 
ducing it.  A  few  years  since  aluminium  was  more 
valuable  than  gold,  .because  it  took  more  labor  to  get 
it.     Labor-saving  improvements  have  already  lowered 


56  DECLARATION. 

the  value  of  aluminium  to  less  than  that  of  silver, 
and  little  more  than  that  of  copper ;  and  it  is  alto- 
gether likely  that  continued  improvement  will  ere 
long  bring  it  to  that  of  iron.  So  the  value  of  steel 
has  been  greatly  lessened  by  the  introduction  of  the 
Bessemer  and  other  processes.  So  the  value  of 
beaver  skins,  of  whalebone,  of  ivory,  etc.,  has  been 
increased  by  the  growing  scarcity  of  the  animals 
from  which  they  are  derived,  and  the  greater  labor 
needed  to  obtain  them.  So,  too,  the  improvement  in 
transportation  has  lessened  the  value  of  things  where 
it  was  a  considerable  item  in  the  labor  required  for 
their  production.  And  so,  too,  customs  duties  and 
other  indirect  taxes  add  to  the  value  of  things  on 
which  they  fall,  because  their  effect  is  to  increase  the 
amount  of  labor  required  to  get  such  things. 

It  is  thus  seen,  with  regard  at  least  to  tlie  greater 
number  of  valuable  things,  that  there  cannot  be 
inherent  or  intrinsic  value  ;  and  that  value  is  simply 
an  expression  of  the  labor  required  for  the  production 
of  such  a  thing.  But  there  are  some  things  as  to 
which  this  is  not  so  clear.  Land  is  not  produced  by 
labor ;  yet  land,  irrespective  of  any  improvements 
that  labor  has  made  on  it,  often  has  value.  And  so 
value  frequently  attaches  to  the  forms  of  the  eco- 
nomic term  "  land  "  that  we  commonly  speak  of  as 
natural  products,  such  as  trees  in  their  natural  state, 
ore  in  the  vein,  stone  or  marble  in  the  quarry,  or 
sand  or  gravel  in  the  bed. 

Yet  a  little  examination  will  show  that  such  facts 
are  but  exemplifications  of  the  general  principle,  just 
as  the  rise  of  a  balloon  and  the  fall  of  a  stone  both 
exemplify  the  universal  law  of  gravitation. 


MB.  spencer's   confusion  AS   TO   VALUE.       57 

To  illustrate :  Let  us  suppose  a  man  accidentally 
to  stumble  on  a  diamond.  Without  the  expenditure 
of  labor,  for  his  effort  has  been  merely  that  of  stoop- 
ing down  to  pick  it  up,  an  action  in  itself  a  gratifi- 
cation of  curiosity,  he  has  here  a  great  value.  But 
what  causes  this  value?  Clearly,  it  springs  from  the 
fact  that,  as  a  rule,  to  get  such  a  diamond  will  require 
much  expenditure  of  labor.  If  any  one  could  pick 
up  diamonds  as  easily  as  in  this  case,  diamonds  would 
have  no  value. 

Or,  here  is  a  grove  of  natural  trees,  which,  as  they 
stand,  and  before  the  touch  of  labor,  have  a  consider- 
able value,  so  that  a  lumberman  will  gladly  pay  for 
the  privilege  of  cutting  them.  But  has  not  this  value 
the  same  cause  as  in  the  case  of  the  diamond  —  the 
fact  that  to  get  such  lumber  ordinarily  (or  to  speak 
exactly,  to  get  the  last  amount  of  such  lumber  that 
the  existing  demand  requires)  the  lumberman  must 
go  so  far  that  the  cost  of  transportation  will  equal 
what  he  is  willing  to  pay  for  these  trees  ? 

In  the  naturally  wooded  sections  of  the  United 
States  trees  had  at  first  not  merely  no  value,  but 
were  deemed  an  incumbrance,  to  get  rid  of  which  the 
settler  had  to  incur  the  labor  of  felling  and  burning. 
Then  lumber  had  no  value  except  the  cost  of  work- 
ing it  up  after  it  had  been  felled ;  for  the  work  of 
felling  had  for  object  the  getting  rid  of  the  tree.  But 
soon,  as  clearing  proceeded,  the  desire  to  get  rid  of 
trees  so  far  slackened,  as  compared  with  the  desire  to 
get  lumber,  that  trees  were  felled  simply  for  the 
purpose  of  getting  the  lumber.  Then  the  value  of 
lumber  increased,  for  the  labor  of  felling  trees  had  to 
be  added  to  it ;  but  trees  themselves  had  as  yet  no 


58  DECLAKATION. 

value.  As  clearing  still  proceeded  and  the  demand 
for  lumber  grew  with  growing  population,  it  became 
necessary  to  go  farther  and  farther  to  get  trees. 
Then  transportation  began  to  be  a  perceptible  ele- 
ment in  the  labor  of  getting  lumber,  and  trees  that 
had  been  left  standing  began  to  liave  a  value,  since 
by  using  them  the  labor  of  transportation  Avould  be 
saved.  And,  as  the  requirement  for  lumber  has  com- 
pelled the  lumbermen  to  go  farther  and  farther,  the 
value  of  the  trees  remaining  has  increased.  But  this 
value  is  not  inherent  in  the  trees  :  it  is  a  value  hav- 
ing its  basis  in  labor,  and  representing  a  saving  of 
labor  that  must  otherwise  be  incurred.  The  reason 
that  the  tree  at  such  place  has  a  value  is,  that  obtain- 
ing it  there  secures  the  same  result  as  would  the 
labor  of  transporting  a  similar  amount  of  lumber 
from  the  greater  distance  to  which  resort  must  be 
made  to  satisfy  the  demand  for  lumber. 

And  so  with  the  value  which  attaches  to  ore 
or  sand  or  gravel.  Such  value  is  always  relative 
to  the  labor  required  to  obtain  such  things  from 
points  of  greater  distance  or  of  less  abundant  de- 
posits, to  which  in  the  existing  demand  resort  is 
necessary. 

We  thus  see  the  cause  and  nature  of  land  values, 
or,  to  use  the  economic  term,  of  rent.  No  matter 
how  fertile  it  may  be,  no  matter  what  other  desirable 
quality  it  may  have,  land  has  no  value  until,  whether 
by  reason  of  quality  or  location,  the  relation  between 
it  and  the  most  advantageous  land  to  which  labor 
may  have  free  access  gives  to  its  use  an  advantage 
equivalent  to  the  saving  of  labor.  Or,  to  state  in 
another  way  that  accepted  theory  which  is  sometimes 


MR.   spencer's   confusion  AS   TO   VALUE.       59 

styled  Ricardo's  theory  of  rent,  and  which  John 
Stuart  Mill  called  the  pons  asinorum  of  political 
economy :  it  is,  tliat  the  rent  of  land  is  determined 
by  the  excess  of  the  produce  it  will  yield  over  that 
which  the  same  application  can  obtain  from  the  least 
productive  land  in  use. 

To  grasp  this  principle  is  to  see  that  land  has  no 
inherent  value ;  that  value  can  never  attach  to  all 
land,  but  only  to  some  land,  and  may  arise  on  par- 
ticular land  either  by  reason  of  production  being 
extended  to  inferior  land,  or  by  reason  of  the  devel- 
opment of  superior  productiveness  in  special  local- 
ities. 

Thus  the  phenomena  of  value  are  at  bottom  illus- 
trations of  one  principle.  The  value  of  everything 
produced  by  labor,  from  a  pound  of  chalk  or  a  paper 
of  pins  to  the  elaborate  structure  and  appurtenances 
of  a  first-class  ocean  steamer,  is  resolvable  on  analy- 
sis into  an  equivalent  of  the  labor  required  to  repro- 
duce such  a  thing  in  form  and  place ;  while  the  value 
of  things  not  produced  by  labor,  but  nevertheless 
susceptible  of  ownership,  is,  in  the  same  way,  resolv- 
able into  an  equivalent  of  the  labor  which  the  owner- 
ship of  such  a  thing  enables  the  owner  to  obtain  or 
save. 

The  reason  why  in  rude  societies  value  attaches 
mainly  or  wholly  to  things  produced  by  labor,  and 
there  is  little  or  no  value  to  land  —  or,  to  use  Mr. 
Spencer's  phrase,  "the  reason  why  in  the  rudest 
societies  the  right  of  property  is  more  definite  in 
respect  of  personal  belongings  than  in  respect  of 
other  things"  —  is  not,  as  he  puts  it,  that  weapons, 
implements,  dress,  decorations,  and  huts  are  "  about 


60  DECLARATION. 

all  the  things  in  which,  at  first,  the  worth  given  by 
effort  is  great  in  comparison  with  tlie  inherent  worth  ; 
for  the  inherent  worth  of  the  wild  food  gathered  or 
canght  is  more  obvious  than  the  worth  of  the  effort 
spent  in  obtaining  it."  It  is  that  labor  products 
always  cost  effort,  and  hence  have  value  from  the 
first;  while  land  costs  no  effort,  and  in  such  societies 
the  growth  of  population  and  the  development  of  the 
arts  have  as  yet  attached  little  or  no  special  advan- 
tages to  the  use  of  particular  pieces  of  land,  which  at 
a  later  stage  are  equivalent  to  a  saving  of  effort. 
Thus,  in  the  absence  of  the  artificial  scarcity  pro- 
duced by  monopoly,  land  of  practically  like  quality 
is  easy  to  obtain  and  has  no  value. 

For  in  a  sparse  population  and  a  rude  state  of 
the  arts,  those  differences  in  productiveness  between 
particular  pieces  of  land,  which  are  so  marked  in 
our  great  cities  that  land  on  one  side  of  a  street  may 
have  twice  the  value  of  land  on  the  other  side,  do 
not  exist.  Even  differences  in  the  original  qualities 
of  land,  that  with  us  give  rise  to  enormous  differences 
in  value,  would,  with  the  hunter  or  herdsman,  or 
even  with  the  agriculturist,  be  of  no  moment.  Who, 
until  production  had  passed  even  the  agricultural 
stage,  could  have  imagined  that  in  the  soil  of 
Western  Pennsylvania  lurked  differences  that  would 
some  time  give  to  one  spot  a  value  hundreds  of  thou- 
sand times  greater  than  that  of  seemingly  the  same 
kind  of  land  around  it;  or  that  a  narrow  strip  in 
Nevada  might  be  worth  millions,  while  the  land 
about  it  was  worth  nothing  at  all? 

It  is  this  confusion  of  Mr.  Spencer  as  to  rent  and 
value   that  has  led  him   into   confusion   as   to   the 


MR.    spencer's   confusion   AS   TO  VALUE.       Gl 

right  of  property ;  and  that,  at  first  at  least,  pre- 
vented him  from  seeing  that  to  .  secure  tlie  equal 
rights  of  men  to  land,  it  is  not  necessary  that  society 
should  take  formal  possession  of  land  and  let  it  out, 
and,  consequently,  that  the  difficulties  he  anticipated 
in  taking  possession  of  improved  land  were  imaginary. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

FROM   "SOCIAL   STATICS "   TO   "POLITICAL  INSTI- 
TUTIONS." 

But  tlie  crudities  and  seeds  of  error  in  Mr. 
Spencer's  treatment  of  the  land  question  in  "  Social 
Statics "  were  of  little  moment  beside  its  sterling 
merit.  It  was  a  clear,  and,  if  we  except  or  explain 
the  one  incongruous  passage,  an  unfaltering  assertion 
of  a  moral  truth  of  the  first  importance  —  a  truth  at 
that  time  ignored.  If  Mr.  Spencer  had  not  mastered 
all  the  details  of  its  application,  he  had  at  least  seen 
and  stated  the  fundamental  principle  that  all  men 
have  natural,  equal  and  inalienable  rights  to  the  use  ■ 
of  land;  that  the  right  of  ownership  which  justly 
attaches  to  things  produced  by  labor  cannot  attach  to 
land ;  that  neither  force,  nor  fraud,  nor  consent,  nor 
transfer,  nor  prescription  can  give  validity  to  private 
property  in  land ;  and  that  equal  rights  to  land  are 
still  valid,  "  all  deeds,  customs,  and  laws  notwith- 
standing," and  must  remain  valid  "  until  it  can  be 
demonstrated  that  God  has  given  one  charter  of 
privileges  to  one  generation  and  another  to  the 
next." 

He  had,  moreover,  shown  that  the  practical  recog- 
nition of  these  equal  rights,  even  in  the  rude  way  he 
proposed,  involved  no  community  of  goods  and  noth- 
ing like  socialism  or  communism  ;  but  that  it  may  be 


"SOCIAL  statics'-  TO  "POLITICAL  INSTITUTIONS."  63 

carried  out  in  a  way  that  "  need  cause  no  very  serious 
revolution  in  existing  arrangements,"  and  would  be 
"  consistent  with  tlie  highest  civilization." 

And  this  was  in  England,  Avhere  the  whole  struc- 
ture of  society  —  social,  political  and  industrial  — 
was  based  on  and  embedded  in  private  ownership  of 
land,  and  in  the  year  1850,  when,  except  by  a  few 
"  dreamers,"  no  one  thought  of  making  any  distinc- 
tion between  property  in  land  and  property  in  other 
things,  and  by  the  vast  majority  of  men  of  all  classes 
and  conditions  private  property  in  land  was  looked 
on  as  something  that  always  had  existed,  and,  in  the 
nature  of  things,  always  must  exist. 

But  beyond  the  warnings  that  this  was  no  way 
to  success,  which  he  doubtless  received  from  friends, 
there  is  no  reason  to  think  that  this  revolutionary 
utterance  of  Mr.  Spencer  in  "  Social  Statics " 
brouglit  him  the  slightest  unpleasant  remonstrance 
at  the  time  or  for  3'^ears  after.  If  "  Sir  John  and  his 
Grace" — by  which  phrase  Mr.  Spencer  had  personified 
British  landed  interests  —  ever  heard  of  the  book,  it 
was  to  snore,  rather  than  to  swear.  So  long  as  they  feel 
secure,  vested  wrongs  are  tolerant  of  mere  academic 
questioning;  for  those  who  profit  by  them,  being  the 
class  of  leisure  and  wealth,  are  also  the  class  of  lib- 
eral education  and  tastes,  and  often  find  a  pleasing 
piquancy  in  radicalism  that  does  not  go  beyond  thei]' 
own  circles.  A  clever  sophist  might  freely  declaim 
in  praise  of  liberty  at  the  table  of  a  Roman  emperor. 
Voltaire,  Rousseau  and  the  encyclopedists  were  the 
fashionable  fad  in  the  drawing-rooms  of  the  French 
aristocracy.  And  at  the  beginning  of  this  century, 
and  for  years  afterwards,  a  theoretical  abolitionist, 


64  DECLARATION. 

provided  he  did  not  talk  in  the  hearing  of  the  serv- 
ants, might  freely  express  his  opinion  of  slavery 
among  the  cultured  slaveholders  of  our  Southern 
states.  Thomas  Jefferson  declared  his  detestation  of 
slavery,  and,  des})ite  amendment,  "writ  large"  his  con- 
demnation of  it  in  the  Declaration  of  Independence 
itself.  Yet  that  declaration  was  signed  by  slavehold- 
ers and  read  annually  by  slaveholders,  and  Jefferson 
himself  never  became  unpopular  with  slaveholders. 
But  when  the  "underground  railway"  got  into  oper- 
ation; when  Garrison  and  his  colleagues  came  with 
their  demand  for  immediate,  unconditional  emancipa- 
tion, then  the  feeling  changed,  and  the  climate  of  the 
South  began  to  grow  hot  for  any  one  even  suspected 
of  doubting  the  justice  of  the  "  peculiar  institution." 

So  it  was  with  private  property  in  land  for  over 
thirty  years  after  "  Social  Sta,tics  "  was  written.  One 
of  the  first  to  congratulate  me  on  "  Progress  and  Pov- 
erty," when  only  an  author's  edition  of  a  few  hundred , 
copies  had  been  printed,  and  it  seemed  unlikely  to 
those  who  knew  the  small  demand  for  works  on  eco- 
nomic questions  that  there  would  ever  be  any  more, 
was  a  very  large  landowner.  He  told  me  that  he  had 
been  able  freely  to  enjoy  what  he  was  pleased  to  term 
the  clear  logic  and  graceful  style  of  my  book,  because 
he  knew  that  it  would  only  be  read  by  a  few  philoso- 
phers, and  could  never  reach  the  masses  or  "  do  any 
harm." 

For  a  long  time  this  was  the  fate  of  Mr.  Spencer's 
declaration  against  private  property  in  land.  It 
doubtless  did  good  work,  finding  here  and  there  a 
mind  where  it  bore  fruit.  But  the  question  had  not 
passed  beyond,  and  Mr.  Spencer's  book  did  not  bring 


"SOCIAL  statics"  TO  'TOLITICAL  INSTITUTIONS."  Go 

it  beyond,  the  point  of  extremely  limited  academic 
discussion. 

Though  it  brought  Mr.  Spencer  the  appreciation  of 
a  narrow  circle,  and  thus  proved  the  beginning  of  his 
literary  career,  "  Social  Statics  "  had  but  a  small  and 
slow  circulation.  The  first  and  only  English  edi- 
tion, as  is  usual  with  books  for  which  no  large  sale  is 
expected,  was  printed  directly  from  type,  without 
making  stereotype  plates.  As  Mr.  Spencer  tells  us 
in  the  preface  to  his  recent  "  revision  and  abridg- 
ment," it  took  some  ten  years  to  sell  that,  after  which, 
the  sale  not  being  enough  to  justify  republication, 
which,  in  the  absence  of  stereotype  plates,  would  have 
involved  the  cost  of  setting  up  the  type  again,  the 
book  went  out  of  print  in  England,  without  having 
attracted  any  general  attention.  This  was  but  in  the 
nature  of  things ;  for  the  class  that  profits  by  any  wrong 
which  affects  the  distribution  of  wealth  must  be  the 
wealthy  class,  and  consequently  the  class  whose  views 
dominate  the  existing  organs  of  opinion.  And  until 
recently  private  property  in  land  has  been  the  sacred 
white  elephant  of  English  respectability,  not  even 
to  be  named  without  a  salaam.  The  conspiracy  of 
silence  was  therefore  all  that  such  a  book  could  expect 
until  it  began  to  make  way  among  the  masses,  and 
that  neither  the  style  of  "  Social  Statics  "  nor  the 
price  at  which  it  was  published  was  calculated  for. 
A  similar  fate  to  that  which  "  Social  Statics  "  met  in 
England  befell  a  ver^^  similar  book,  covering  much  the 
same  ground — "The  Theory  of  Human  Progres- 
sion," by  Patrick  Edward  Dove,  published  a  little 
before  "  Social  Statics,"  but  in  the  same  year,  and 
also  asserting  the  equal  right  to  the   use    of   land. 


66  DECLARATION, 

While  Dove  is  not  so  elaborate  as  Spencer,  he  is 
clearer  in  distinctly  disclaiming  the  idea  of  compen- 
sation, and  in  proposing  to  take  ground  rent  for 
public  purposes  by  taxation,  abolishing  all  other 
taxes.  His  book  must  have  done  some  erood  work 
on  the  minds  it  reached,  but  it  passed  out  of  print 
and  was  practically' forgotten. 

"Social  Statics,"  however,  had  a  happier  fate  in 
passing  over  to  the  United  States.  Among  those 
early  attracted  by  Mr.  Spencer's  writings  was  the 
late  Professor  E.  L.  Youmans,  who  in  1861-62  sought 
his  acquaintance  and  entered  into  correspondence  with 
him.  Professor  Youmans's  tireless  energy,  backed 
by  the  resources  of  the  strong  publishing  house  of 
D.  Appleton  &  Co.  of  New  York,  with  which  he  was 
connected,  was  thenceforward  devoted  to  the  task  of 
popularizing  Mr.  Spencer  and  his  teachings  in  the 
United  States.  Through  the  efforts  of  Professor 
Youmans,  D.  Appleton  &  Co.  arranged  with  Mr.' 
Spencer  for  the  publication  of  liis  books,  and  in 
1864,  making  stereotype  plates,  they  re-issued  "Social 
Statics,"  and  from  that  time  forward  kept  it  in  print ; 
and  as  may  be  seen,  both  from  the  preface  of  1877  in 
their  edition  of  "Social  Statics  "and  from  the  preface 
to  the  abridgment  of  1892,  such  English  demand  as 
existed  was  supplied  by  the  sending-over  of  sheets 
printed  by  them  ^  —  a  more  economical  arrangement 
than  that  of  ]3rinting  a  book  of  small  circulation  on 

^  A  number  of  years  passed  —  some  ten,  I  think  —  before  the 
edition  was  exhausted;  and  as  tlie  demand  seemed  not  great 
enough  to  warrant  the  setting  up  of  type  for  a  new  edition,  it  was 
decided  to  import  an  edition  from  America,  wliere  tlie  worlc  had 
been  stereotyped.  After  this  had  been  disposed  of  a  third  edition 
was  similarly  imported. — Preface  to  ''^Social  Statics  Ahrhlyed 
and  Revised,''  1892. 


"SOCIAL  statics"'  TO  '^rOLITICAL  INSTITUTIONS."  67 

both  sides  of  the  Atlantic.  Thus  in  a  larger  sphere 
it  continued  to  circulate,  mainly  in  the  United  States 
(where  Mr.  Spencer's  reputation,  aided  by  the  active 
work  of  Professor  Youmans,  grew  first  in  popular 
estimation),  and  to  some  small  extent  at  least  in 
Great  Britain.  But  the  radical  utterances  on  the  land 
question  that  it  contained  gave  no  evidence  of  attracts 
ing  active  interest  or  passing  for  more  than  an  aca- 
demic opinion. 

Between  1850  and  1882,  during  the  greater  part  of 
which  time  Mr.  Spencer  was  engaged  in  developing 
his  evolution  philosophy,  nothing  more  that  I  am 
aware  of  was  heard  from  him  on  the  land  question. 
But  "  Social  Statics,"  in  the  United  States  at  least, 
increased  in  circulation  as  Mr.  Spencer's  reputation 
grew,  and  its  declarations  continued  to  stand  for  his 
opinions  without  even  a  suggestion  of  change.  Sev- 
eral prefaces,  or  notes,  were  from  time  to  time  added, 
but  none  indicating  any  modification  of  views  with 
regard  to  the  land  question.  The  last  of  these  was 
dated  January  17,  1877.  In  this,  certain  changes  in 
Mr.  Spencer's  oj^inions  as  to  teleological  implications, 
the  political  status  of  women,  the  useful  effects  of 
war,  etc.,  are  noted,  but  there  is  no  modification  of  the 
radical  utterances  as  to  the  tenure  of  land.  On  the 
contrary,  he  says  : 

To  the  fundamental  ethical  principle  expressing  in  its 
abstract  form  what  we  know  as  justice  I  still  adhere. 
I  adhere  also  to  the  derivative  principles  formulated  in 
what  are  commonly  called  personal  rights,  of  this  or  that 
special  kind. 

In  "  Political  Institutions,"  which,  after  some  masr- 
azine  publications  of  chapters,  was  finally  published 


68  DECLARATION. 

in  book  form  in  the  early  part  of  1882,  Mr.  Spencer 
again  spoke  of  the  tenure  of  land,  and  in  a  way  that 
would  lead  any  one  acquainted  with  his  previous  fuller 
treatment  of  the  subject  to  understand  that  he  still 
adhered  to  all  that  he  had  said  in  "  Social  Statics." 

"  Political  Institutions,"  like  the  other  divisions  of 
"The  Principles  of  Sociology"  to  which  it  belongs, is 
"  in  part  a  retrospect  and  in  part  a  prospect.  "  First 
explaining  in  accordance  with  his  general  theory  how 
social  institutions  have  been  evolved,  Mr.  Spencer 
proceeds  to  indicate  what  he  thinks  will  be  the  course 
of  their  further  evolution.  In  the  chapter  on  "Prop- 
erty," after  some  pages  of  examination  he  says,  (Sec- 
tion 539) : 

Induction  and  deduction  uniting  to  show  as  they  do 
that  at  first  land  is  common  property,  there  presents 
itself  the  question  —  How  did  tlie  possession  of  it  be- 
come individualized  ?  There  can  be  little  doubt  of  the 
general  nature  of  the  answer.  Force,  in  one  form  or- 
other,  is  the  sole  cause  adequate  to  make  the  members  of 
a  society  yield  up  their  joint  claim  to  the  area  they 
inhabit.  Such  force  n^w  be  that  of  an  external  aggressor 
or  that  of  an  internal  aggressor :  but  in  either  case  it 
implies  militant  activity. 

Having  thus  repeated  in  a  form  adapted  to  the 
character  of  the  book  the  declaration  of  "  Social  Stat- 
ics" that  the  original  deeds  to  private  property  in 
land  were  written  with  the  sword,  he  proceeds  to 
develop  it,  showing  by  the  way  a  comprehension  of 
the  fact  that  the  feudal  tenures  did  not  recognize  the 
private  property  in  land  which  has  grown  up  since, 
or,  as  he  phrases  it,  that  "  the  private  land-ownership 
established  by  militancy  is  an  incomplete  one,"  being 


"SOCIAL  statics"  TO  "POLITICAL  INSTITUTIONS."  G9 

qualified  by  the  claims  of  serfs  and  other  dependants, 
and  by  obligations  to  the  crown  or  state,  and  saying  : 

In  our  own  case  the  definite  ending  of  these  tenures 
took  place  in  1660 ;  when  for  feudal  obligations  (a  burden 
on  landowners)  was  substituted  a  beer-excise  (a  burden 
on  the  community). 

From  this,  in  a  passage  which  will  hereafter  appear,^ 
he  proceeds  to  consider  what  is  likely  to  be  the  future 
evolution  of  land  tenure.  Saying  that  "  ownership 
established  by  force  does  not  stand  on  the  same  foot- 
ing as  ownership  established  by  contract,"  he  likens 
individual  property  in  land  to  property  in  slaves,  and 
intimates  that  as  the  one  has  disappeared  so  the  other 
will  doubtless  disappear,  to  make  place  for  land- 
holding  "by  virtue  of  agreements  between  individuals 
as  tenants  and  the  community  as  land-owner,  .  .  . 
after  making  full  allowance  for  the  accumulated  value 
artificially  giveny 

This  is  a  re-statement  of  what  was  said  in  Section  9 
of  "Social  Statics,"  where,  speaking  of  the  once  uni- 
versal assumption  that  slavery  was  natural  and  right 
and  the  better  faith  that  had  been  generated,  he 
adds  : 

It  may  by-and-by  be  perceived  that  equity  utters 
decrees  to  which  we  have  not  yet  listened,  and  men  may 
then  learn  that  to  deprive  others  of  their  rights  to  the 
use  of  the  earth  is  to  commit  a  crime  inferior  only  in 
wickedness  to  the  crime  of  taking  away  their  lives  or 
personal  liberty. 

Thus,  in  so  far  as  was  consistent  with  the  very  dif- 
ferent scope  and  character  of  the  book,  Mr.  Spencer 

^  See  Mr.  Spencer's  letter  to  the  Times,  pp.  98-9. 


70  DECLARATION. 

repeated  in  March,  1882,  the  views  on  the  land  ques- 
tion that  he  had  set  forth  in  1850.  And  in  this  con- 
nection the  words  I  have  italicized  are  noteworthy  as 
showing  what  was  really  meant  in  that  incongruous 
passage  in  "  Social  Statics  "  previously  discussed. 

With  this  re-assertion  in  "  Political  Institutions " 
of  the  views  on  the  land  question  set  forth  in  "  Social 
Statics  "  we  must  draw  a  line  in  our  review. 


I*A.RT   II. 

REPUDIATION. 


I.  LETTER  TO  THE    ST.  JAMES'S  GAZETTE, 

II.  "  THE  MAN  VERSUS  THE   STATE.  " 

III.  LETTER  TO  THE  TIMES. 

IV.  THIS  APOLOGY   EXAMINED. 

V.  SECOND  LETTER  TO  THE  TIMES. 

VI.  MORE  LETTERS. 


There  are  people  who  hate  anything  in  the  shape  of  exact  conckisions; 
and  these  are  of  them.  According  to  such,  tlie  right  is  never  in  either 
extreme,  but  always  half  way  between  the  extremes.  They  are  continually 
trying  to  reconcile  Yes  and  J\'"o.  Ifs  and  buts,  and  excepts,  are  their  delight. 
They  have  so  great  a  faith  in  "  the  judicious  mean"  that  they  would  scarcely 
believe  an  oracle,  if  it  uttered  a  full-length  principle.  Were  you  to  enquire 
of  them  whether  the  earth  turns  on  its  axis  from  east  to  west,  or  from  west 
to  east,  you  might  almost  expect  the  reply  — "A  little  of  both,"  or  "Not 
exactly  either."  It  is  doubtful  whetlier  they  would  assent  to  the  axiom  that 
the  whole  is  greater  than  its  part,  without  making  some  qualification.  —  JI>^rhtrt 
Spencer,  1850. 


CHAPTER  I. 

LETTER   TO   THE   ST.   JAMES'S   GAZETTE. 

With  the  early  years  of  the  last  decade  a  marked 
change  in  common  thought  began  to  show  itself; 
and  the  doctrine  of  natural,  inalienable  and  equal 
rights  to  land,  which  Mr.  Spencer  had  avowed 
as  it  were  in  academic  groves,  began  to  stir  in  the 
hearts  and  minds  of  common  men,  and  to  make  way 
among  the  great  disinherited.  Vaguely  and  blindly, 
the  land  question  had  come  to  the  front  in  Ireland, 
and  in  this  form  forced  its  way  into  British  politics. 
And  "  Progress  and  Poverty,"  first  published  in  the 
United  States  in  1879,  had  begun,  by  the  close  of 
1882,  to  circulate  in  Great  Britain  as  no  economic 
work  had  ever  circulated  before,  re-inforcing  what 
Herbert  Spencer  had  said  of  the  ethical  injustice  of 
private  property  in  land  with  the  weight  of  political 
economy  and  the  proposal  of  a  practical  measure  for 
restoring  equal  rights.  Everywhere,  in  short,  that 
the  English  language  is  spoken,  the  idea  of  natural 
rights  to  the  use  of  land,  that  in  1850  seemed  dead, 
was  beginning  to  revive  with  a  power  and  in  a  form 
that  showed  tliat  the  struggle  for  its  recognition  had 
at  last  begun. 

Believing  in  Mr.  Spencer's  good  faith,  deeming  him 
not  a  mere  prater  about  justice,  but  one  who  ardently 
desired  to  carry  it  into  practice,  we  who  sought  to 


74  EEPUDIATIOK. 

promote  what  he  himself  had  said  that  equity  sternly 
commanded  naturally  looked  for  some  word  of  sym- 
pathy and  aid  from  him,  the  more  so  as  the  years  had 
brought  him  position  and  influence,  the  ability  to 
command  attention,  and  the  power  to  affect  a  large 
body  of  admirers  who  regard  him  as  their  intellectual 
leader. 

But  we  looked  in  vain.  When  the  Justice  that 
in  the  academic  cloister  he  had  so  boldly  invoked 
came  forth  into  the  streets  and  market-places,  to  raise 
her  standard  and  call  her  lovers,  Mr.  Spencer,  instead 
of  hastening  to  greet  her,  did  his  best  to  get  out  of 
her  way,  like  the  young  wife  in  the  old  story,  Avho 
charmed  the  by-standers  with  her  invocations  to 
Death  to  take  her  rather  than  her  elderly  husband, 
but  who,  when  Death  rapped  at  the  door  and  asked, 
'•  Who  calls  me  ?  "  quickly  replied,  "  The  gentleman 
in  the  next  room  !  " 

In  March,  1882,  when  Mr.  Spencer  issued  "  Politi- ' 
cal  Institutions,"  and  even  in  August  of  the  same 
year,  when  he  left  England  for  a  visit  to  the  United 
States,  there  was  on  the  surface  of  English  society 
nothing  to  indicate  that  such  views  as  he  had  ex- 
pressed in  "  Social  Statics  "  were  any  nearer  attract- 
ing popular  attention  and  arousing  feeling  than  in 
1850,  for  the  Irish  land  movement  was  considered  what 
it  indeed  was  in  the  main,  —  not  an  attack  on  private 
property  in  land,  but  an  effort  of  Irish  tenants  to 
become  land-owners  or  to  get  better  terms.  But 
when  Mr.  Spencer  returned,  towards  the  close  of 
November,  it  was  to  find  that  the  days  of  contemptu- 
ous tolerance  on  the  part  of  Sir  John  and  his  Grace 
had  gone,  and  that  all  that   was  deemed  "  respecta- 


LETTER   TO   THE   ST.  JAMES's   GAZETTE.  75 

ble "  in  English  society  had  become  roused  to  the 
wickedness  of  those  who  denied  the  validity  of 
private  property  in  land. 

To  explain  the  change  that  had  taken  place  in  this 
brief  interval  I  must  refer  to  my  own  books. 

"  Progress  and  Poverty "  was  received  by  the 
English  press,  as  all  such  books  are  at  first,  in  silence 
or  Avith  brief  derision.  Messrs.  Kegan  Paul,  Trench 
&  Co.,  who  first  published  it  in  England,  in  sheets 
brought  from  the  United  States,  were  on  publication 
able  to  sell  only  twenty  copies  in  all  the  three  king- 
doms. But  ere  long  it  began  to  make  its  way,  and 
when,  towards  the  close  of  Avigust,  1882,  a  sixpenny 
edition  was  issued,  it  began  to  sell  in  tens  and  scores 
of  thousands,  "  in  the  alleys  and  back  streets  of 
England,"  the  Quarterly  Revietv  said  —  "  audibly  wel- 
comed there  as  a  glorious  gospel  of  justice." 

Hardly  was  this  cheap  edition  out  and  beginning 
to  circulate,  when,  conjoining  with  it  my  pamphlet  on 
"  The  Irish  Land  Question,"  ^  which  had  also  been  pub- 
lished in  England  in  cheap  form,  the  Times,  on  Sep- 
tember 11, 1882,  gave  to  "  Progress  and  Poverty"  a 
long  and  fair  review.  At  once  the  silence  of  the 
press  was  broken,  and  from  the  quarterlies  to  the 
comic  papers  the  British  journals  began  to  teem  with 
notices  and  references,  most  of  them  naturally  of  a 
kind  that  made  the  Duke  of  Argyll  seem  mild  when 
he  called  me  "  such  a  preacher  of  unrighteousness  as 
the  world  has  never  seen,"  and  spoke  of  my  "im- 
moral doctrines"  and  "profligate  conclusions,"  the 

^  Now  published  under  the  name  of  "  The  Land  Question,"  since 
its  effort  is  to  show  that  the  Irish  Land  Question  is  simply  the  uni- 
versal land  question. 


76  EEPUDIATION. 

"unutterable  meanness  of  the  gigantic  villainy"  I 
advocated,  and  so  on. 

And  from  being  regarded  in  this  way  in  the  very 
society  in  which  as  a  great  philoso})her  he  had  come 
to  be  an  honored  member,  it  was  evident  that  Mr. 
Spencer  could  not  escape  if  he  adhered  to  his  views. 
For  although  "  Social  Statics  "  was  little  known  in 
England,  the  quotations  I  had  made  from  it,  both 
in  "  Progress  and  Poverty  "  and  in  "  The  Irish  Land 
Question "  were  bringing  those  views  into  sharp 
prominence. 

This  was  the  situation  as  Mr.  Spencer  found  it  on 
his  return  from  the  United  States.  The  burning  ques- 
tion —  a  question  beside  which  that  of  chattel  slavery 
was  almost  small  —  had  been  raised  in  England.  And 
he  must  either  stand  for  the  truth  he  had  seen,  and 
endure  social  ostracism  for  it,  or  he  must  deny  it. 

"  Blessed  are  ye  when  men  shall  revile  you,  and 
persecute  you,  and  say  all  manner  of  evil  against 
you!"  For  this  to  the  man  who  has  striven  to  up- 
root a  great  wrong  —  a  wrong  that  by  the  fact  of  its 
hitherto  unquestioned  existence  has  necessarily  en- 
listed on  its  side  all  the  powerful  influences  that 
dominate  the  organs  of  opinion  and  rule  society  —  is 
the  sure  sign  that  the  day  he  has  hoped  for  is  at  hand. 

When,  in  1850,  Mr.  Sj)encer  had  said  that  the  rent 
of  land  could  be  collected  by  an  agent  or  deputy 
agent  of  the  community,  quite  as  well  as  by  an 
aofent  of  Sir  John  or  his  Grace,  he  must  have  known 
that  if  ever  his  proposition  attracted  the  attention  of 
the  interests  he  thus  personified  he  would  be  de- 
nounced in  all  the  established  organs  of  opinion,  and 
in  "  polite  society  "  regarded  as  a  robber.     Then,  I 


LETTER    TO   THE   ST.  JAMES  S    GAZETTE.  i  i 

am  inclined  to  think  be  would  have  hailed  with  joy 
such  indications  of  the  progress  of  thought.  But  in 
1882,  he  no  sooner  found  that  Sir  John  and  his  Grace 
had  been  aroused  by  such  a  proposition  and  Avere 
likely  to  hear  that  he  had  made  it,  than  he  hastened 
to  get  the  evidence  out  of  their  sight,  and  as  far  as 
he  could  to  deny  it.  At  once,  it  seems  from  what 
he  tells  us  in  1892,  he  "  resolved  not  again  to  import 
a  supply "  of  "  Social  Statics,"  ^  and  took  the  first 
opportunity  to  write  a  letter. 

The  Edinhirgh  Review,  for  January,  1883,  in  an 
article  entitled  "•  The  Nationalization  of  the  Land,"  re- 
viewed "  Progress  and  Poverty"  —  as  fairly,  it  seemed 
to  me,  as  could  be  expected,  but  of  course  adversely. 
In  doing  so  it  referred  to  what  Mr.  Spencer  had  said 
on  the  land  question  in  "•  Social  Statics,"  giving  him 
credit  for  proposing  to  indemnify  land-owners,  and 
quoting  with  that  interpretation  the  incongruous 
sentences  in  Section  9.     In  concluding  it  said: 

Writers  like  Mr.  George  and  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
are  at  war  not  only  with  the  first  principles  of  political 
economy  and  of  law,  of  social  order  and  domestic  life, 
but  with  the  elements  of  human  nature.  .  .  .  To  attack 
the  rights  of  private  property  in  land  is  to  attack  prop- 
erty in  its  most  concrete  form.  If  landed  property  is 
not  secure,  no  property  can  be  protected  by  law,  and  the 
transmission  of  wealth,  be  it  large  or  small,  is  extin- 
guished. With  it  expires  the  perpetuity  of  famil}'  life, 
and  that  future  which  cheers  and  ennobles  the  labor  of 
the  present  with  the  hopes  of  the  future.  These  are 
the  doctrines  of  communism,  fatal  alike  to  the  welfare 
of  society  and  to  the  moral  character  of  man. 

^  Ten  years  ago,  after  all  copies  of  the  third  edition  had  been 
sold,  I  resolved  not  again  to  import  a  supply  to  meet  the  still  con- 
tinued demand. —  Preface  to '' Social  Statics,  Abridged  and  Re- 
vised,'' 1892. 


78  REPUDIATION. 

This  brought  out  from  Mr.  Spencer  a  letter  to  the 
St.  James's  Gazette  of  London,  an  able  Tory  journal. 
Since  he  was  writing  on  the  subject,  here  was  an 
opportunity  for  Mr.  Spencer  to  correct  the  misappre- 
hension (as  I  now  think  it  to  be)  that  he  had  in 
"  Social  Statics  "  proposed  to  compensate  land-owners 
for  their  land.  And,  if  he  wished  to  defend  himself 
against  the  charge  of  attacking  property  rights  and 
upholding  the  doctrines  of  communism,  here  was  an 
opportunity  for  him  to  show,  for  all  of  us  as  well  as 
for  himself,  that  the  denial  of  the  justice  of  private 
property  in  land  involves  no  denial  of  true  property 
rights.  Or  if  he  chose  to  do  so,  here  \fa,s  a  chance 
for  him  straightforwardly  to  recant,  to  aj)ologize  to 
land-owners,  and  to  plead  that  he  was  young  and 
foolish  when  he  asserted,  as  quoted  by  the  Edin- 
burgh, that  "  equity  does  not  permit  property  in 
land,  and  that  the  riglit  of  mankind  to  the  earth's 
surface  is  still  valid,  all  deeds,  customs,  and  laws 
notwithstanding."' 

But,  instead  of  manfully  defending  the  truth  he 
had  uttered,  or  straightforwardly  recanting  it,  Mr. 
Spencer  sought  to  shelter  himself  behind  ifs  and 
buts,  perhapses  and  it-may-bes,  and  the  implication 
of  untruths.     Here  is  his  letter: 

To  the  Editor  of  the  St.  James's  Gazette: 

During  my  abseuce  in  America,  there  appeared  in  the 
St.  James's  Gazette  (27th  of  October,  1882)  an  arti- 
cle entitled  "  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer's  Political  Theories." 
Though,  when  it  was  pointed  out  to  me  after  my  return, 
I  felt  prompted  to  say  something  in  explanation  of  my 
views,  I  should  i)robably  have  let  the  matter  pass  had  I 
not  found  that  elsewhere  such  serious  misapprehensions 
of  them  are  being  diffused  that  rectification  seems 
imperative. 


LETTER   TO   THE   ST.  JAMES's   GAZETTE.  79 

Before  commenting  on  the  statements  of  your  con- 
tributor, I  must  devote  a  paragraph  to  certain  more 
recent  statements  which  have  far  less  justification.  In 
ohi  days  among  the  Persians,  tlie  subordination  of  subject 
to  ruler  was  so  extreme  that,  even  when  punished,  the 
subject  thanked  the  ruler  for  taking  notice  of  him. 
With  like  humility  I  suppose  that  now,  when  after  I 
have  been  publishing  books  for  a  third  of  a  century 
'•  the  leading  critical  organ  "  has  recognized  my  exist- 
ence, I  ought  to  feel  thankful,  even  though  the  recog- 
nition draws  forth  nothing  save  blame.  But  such  ela- 
tion as  I  might  otherwise  be  expected  to  feel  is  checked 
by  two  facts.  One  is  that  the  Edinburgh  Review  has 
not  itself  discovered  me,  but  has  had  its  attention  drawn 
to  me  by  quotations  in  the  work  of  ]\[r.  Henry  George 
—  a  work  which  I  closed  after  a  few  minutes  on  finding 
how  visionary  were  its  ideas.  The  other  is  that,  though 
there  has  been  thus  made  known  to  the  reviewer  a  book 
of  mine  published  thirty-two  years  ago,  which  I  have 
withdrawn  from  circulation  in  England,  and  of  which  I 
have  interdicted  translations,  he  is  apparently  unconscious 
that  I  have  written  other  books,  sundry  of  them  politi- 
cal ;  and  especially  he  seems  not  to  know  that  the  last 
of  them,  *' Political  Institutions,''  contains  passages  con- 
cerning the  question  he  discusses.  Writers  in  critical 
journals  which  have  reputations  to  lose  usually  seek  out 
the  latest  version  of  an  author's  views ;  and  the  more 
conscientious  among  them  take  the  trouble  to  ascertain 
whether  the  constructions  they  put  on  detached  pas- 
sages are  warranted  or  not  by  other  passages.  Had  the 
Edinburgh  reviewer  read  even  the  next  chapter  to  the 
one  from  which  he  quotes,  he  would  have  seen  that,  so 
far  from  attacking  the  right  of  private  property,  as  he 
represents,  my  aim  is  to  put  that  right  upon  an  unques- 
tionable basis,  the  basis  alleged  by  Locke  being  unsatis- 
factory. He  would  have  further  seen  that,  so  far  from 
giving  any  countenance  to  communistic  doctrines,  I  have 
devoted  four  sections  of  that  chapter  to  the  refutation 
of  them.  Had  he  dipped  into  the  latter  part  of  the 
work,  or  had  he  consulted  the  more  recently  published 
"Study  of  Sociology "  and  "Political  Institutions,"  he 
would  not  have  recklessly  coupled  me  with  Mr.  George 
as  upholding  "  the  doctrines  of  communism,  fatal  alike 


80  KEPUDIATIOK. 

to  the  welfare  of  society  and  to  tlie  moral  character  of 
man  "  ;  for  he  would  have  discovered  the  fact  (familiar 
to  many,  though  unknown  to  him)  that  much  current 
legislation  is  regarded  by  me  as  communistic,  and  is  for 
this  reason  condemned  as  socially  injurious  and  individ- 
ually degrading. 

The  writer  of  the  article  in  the  aS^^.  James's  Gazette 
does  not  represent  the  facts  correctly  when  he  says  that 
the  view  concerning  ownership  of  land  in  "  Social  Stat- 
ics "  is  again  expounded  in  "  Political  Institutions  "  — 
*'not  so  fully,  but  with  as  much  confidence  as  ever."  In 
this  last  work  I  have  said  that,  ''though  industrialism 
has  thus  far  tended  to  individualize  possession  of  land, 
while  individualizing  all  other  possession,  it  may  be 
doubted  whether  the  final  stage  is  at  present  reached." 
Further  on  I  have  said  that  "  at  a  stage  still  more 
advanced,  it  may  be  that  private  ownership  of  land  will 
disappear";  and  that  '■'■it  seems  possible  that  the  primi- 
tive ownership  of  land  by  the  community  .  .  .  will  be 
revived."  And  yet  again  I  have  said  that  ^^ jjerhaps  the 
right  of  the  community  to  the  land,  thus  tacitly  asserted, 
will,  in  time  to  come,  be  overtly  asserted."  Now  it 
seems  to  me  that  the  words  I  have  italicised  imply  no 
great  "  confidence."  Contrariwise,  I  think  they  show 
quite  clearly  that  the  opinion  conveyed  is  a  tentative 
one.  The  fact  is,  that  I  liave  here  expressed  myself  iu 
a  way  much  more  qualified  than  is  usual  with  me ; 
because  I  do  not  see  how  certain  tendencies,  which  are 
apparently  conflicting,  will  eventually  work  out.  The 
purely  ethical  view  of  the  matter  does  not  obviously 
harmonize  with  the  political  and  the  politico-economical 
views ;  some  of  the  apparent  incongruities  being  of  the 
kind  indicated  by  your  contributor.  This  is  not  the 
place  to  repeat  my  reasons  for  thinking  that  the  present 
system  will  not  be  the  ultimate  system.  Nor  do  I  pro- 
pose to  consider  the  obstacles,  doubtless  great,  which 
stand  in  the  way  of  change.  All  which  I  wish  here  to 
point  out  is  that  my  opinion  is  by  no  means  a  positive 
one  ;  and,  further,  that  I  regard  the  question  as  one  to 
be  dealt  with  in  the  future  rather  than  at  present. 
These  two  things  the  quotations  I  have  given  above 
prove  conclusively.     I  am,  etc., 

Herbert  Spencek. 


LETTER   TO   THE   ST.  JAMES's   GAZETTE.  81 

Mr.  Spencer  has  had  much  to  say  of  the  unfair- 
ness of  his  critics.  But  this  reply  is  not  merely 
unfair ;  it  is  dishonest,  and  that  in  a  way  that  makes 
flat  falsehood  seem  manly. 

From  this  letter  tlie  casual  reader  would  under- 
stand that  the  Edinburgh  reviewer,  on  the  strength 
of  detached  passages,  had  charged  Mr.  Spencer  with 
attacking  the  right  of  private  property  and  upholding 
socialism,  in  a  sense  unwarranted  by  the  context  and 
disproved  by  the  next  chapter ;  and  that  the  pas- 
sage quoted  from  "Political  Institutions"  covers  the 
same  ground  and  disproves  the  constructions  put  on 
"Social  Statics." 

The  fact  is,  that  the  Edinburgh  Review  had  not 
charged  either  Mr.  Spencer  or  myself  with  more  than 
attacking  private  property  in  land.  This  we  had 
both  unquestionably  done,  not  only  in  the  passages 
it  had  quoted,  but  in  many  others.  It  had  made  no 
misconstruction  whatever.  What  it  had  said  of 
"  attacking  the  right  of  private  property  "  and  "  up- 
holding the  doctrines  of  communism  "  was  a  mere 
rhetorical  flourish,  made  as  an  inference  from,  and 
by  way  of  reply  to,  our  denial  of  the  right  of  private 
property  in  land.  Mr.  Spencer  ignores  the  real 
charge  and  assumes  the  mere  inference  to  be  the 
charge.  Thus,  changing  the  issue,  he  cites  the  next 
chapter  as  if  it  disproved  the  Ediyihurgh^s  charge. 
This  chapter  (Chapter  X.,  "The  Right  of  Property") 
which  has  been  given  in  full,  contains  nothing  to 
lessen  the  force  of  the  attack  on  private  property  in 
land  made  in  the  preceding  chapter.  On  the  contrary, 
in  this  chapter  he  reiterates  his  attack  on  private 
property  in  land,  and  seeks  a  basis  for  property  by 


82  nEPUDIATION. 

carrying  the  idea  that  the  community  should  control 
land  to  the  length  of  absurdity. 

Nor  was  the  writer  in  the  St.  Jameses  unjustified 
in  taking  the  reference  to  land  in  "Political  Insti- 
tutions "  to  be  a  briefer  indorsement  of  the  views 
more  fully  set  forth  in  "  Social  Statics ; "  for  "  Politi- 
cal Institutions  "  refers  to  private  property  in  land 
as  established  by  force,  says  that  it  does  not  stand  on 
the  same  basis  as  ownership  established  by  contract, 
likens  it  to  slavery  and  predicts  its  abolition  —  ex- 
pressions which,  in  the  absence  of  any  modification 
of  the  views  elaborately  asserted  in  "  Social  Statics," 
could  be  taken  in  no  other  way  than  as  indorsing 
them.  The  passages  Mr.  Spencer  quotes  no  more 
modify  the  view  of  land  ownership  set  forth  in 
"  Social  Statics  "  than  Lord  Lytton's  "  Coming  Race  " 
controverts  Adam  Smith's  "  Wealth  of  Nations."  In 
"Social  Statics"  Mr.  Spencer  declares  what  ought  to 
be  done ;  in  the  passage  he  quotes  from  "  Political 
Institutions "  he  is  prognosticating  as  to  what  it 
is  likely  tvill  be  done.  By  now  substituting  prognos- 
tication for  declaration  of  right,  Mr.  Spencer  seeks 
to  convey  the  false  impression  that  the  Edinburgh 
reviewer  has  been  guilty  of  carelessness,  and  the 
writer  in  the  ^S'^.  Jameses  of  misrepresentation,  and 
that  he  himself  has  never  gone  further  than  to  express 
the  guarded  opinion  that  at  some  time,  a  great  way 
off,  men  may  substitute  a  common  ownership  of  land 
for  private  ownership. 

Mr.  Spencer  is  more  than  unfair,  too,  in  assuming 
that  the  charge  of  upholding  communism,  etc.,  is 
applicable  to  me,  though  not  to  him.  For,  although 
my  book  was  too  visionary  for  him  to  read,  he  had  at 


LETTER   TO   THE   ST.  JAMES's   GAZETTE.  83 

least  read  the  EdinhurgKs  article,  and  knew  that  the 
charge  against  me  had  no  other  ground  than  that 
against  him  —  the  denial  of  the  moral  validity  of 
private  property  in  land. 

Even  what  he  says  about  such  a  plain  matter  of 
fact  as  the  withdrawal  of  "Social  Statics  "  from  circu- 
lation in  England  conveys  untruth. 

The  grievance  that  Mr.  Spencer  here  alleges  is 
that  the  Edinburgh  Review  had  commented  on  a  book 
"published  thirty-two  years  ago,  which  I  have  with- 
drawn from  circulation  in  England,  and  of  which  I 
have  interdicted  translations."  What  is  to  be  under- 
stood from  this,  and  what  Mr.  Spencer  evidently 
intended  to  have  understood,  is  that  he  had,  pre- 
sumably years  before,  withdrawn  "  Social  Statics " 
from  circulation  —  not  in  the  mere  territory  of  Eng- 
land, as  distinguished  from  Scotland,  Ireland  or  the 
United  States,  but  —  in  English.  To  make  sure  of 
Lais  understanding,  he  adds  that  he  has  interdicted 
translations  —  which  means,  not  in  other  places,  but 
in  other  lanoruaQ-es  than  Eno-lish.  Now  the  truth  is, 
that  at  the  time  he  thus  wrote,  that  book  was  being 
published  by  his  arrangement  in  the  United  States, 
as  it  had  been  for  years  before,  and  continued  to  be 
for  years  afterwards ;  and  that  up  to  this  very  time 
he  had  been  importing  it  into  England,  and  circulat- 
ing it  there.  The  only  filament  of  truth  in  this 
statement,  which  though  made  incidentally  is  of 
prime  importance  to  his  purpose,  is,  as  we  now  dis- 
cover from  his  own  utterance  in  1892,  that  at  this 
very  time,  or  possibly  a  few  weeks  previous,  he  had 
resolved  not  again  to  import  any  more  copies  of 
"  Social    Statics "   into   England    from   the   United 


84  REPUDIATION. 

States,  tliougli  still  keeping  the  book  iu  circulation 
there,  to  be  bought  by  whomsoever  would  buy  ! 

As  for  the  rest  of  this  letter,  the  admirers  of  Mr. 
Spencer  may  decide  for  themselves  what  kind  of 
ethical  views  they  are  that  will  not  harmonize  with 
political  economy,  and  what  kind  of  political  economy 
it  is  that  will  not  harmonize  with  ethics,  and  wliat  they 
think  of  an  ethical  teacher  who,  on  a  question  that 
involves  the  health  and  happiness,  nay,  the  very  life 
and  death  of  great  bodies  of  men,  shelters  himself 
behind  such  phrases  as,  "it  may  be  doubted,"  "it 
may  be,"  "  it  seems  possible,"  and  so  on,  and  en- 
deavors to  make  them  show  that  he  regards  the 
matter  of  right  as  one  to  deal  with  in  the  future 
and  not  at  present. 

This  letter  is  not  a  withdrawal  or  a  recantation  of 
what  Mr.  Spencer  had  said  against  private  property 
in  land.  It  does  not  rise  to  that  dignity.  It  is  merely 
an  attempt  to  avoid  responsibility  and  to  placate  by 
subterfuge  the  powerful  landed  interests  now  aroused 
to  anger.  But  it  does  indicate  that  a  moral  change 
had  come  over  Mr.  Spencer  since  he  wrote  "  Social 
Statics." 

In  several  places  in  that  book  occurs  the  strong, 
idiomatic  phrase,  "  a  straight  man."  This  letter  to 
the  St.  James's  is  not  the  letter  of  a  straight  man. 

But  as  hypocrisy  is  the  homage  vice  pays  to  virtue, 
so  the  very  crookedness  of  this  letter  indicates  Mr. 
Spencer's  reluctance  to  flatly  deny  the  truth  to  which 
he  had  borne  witness.  lie  no  more  wanted  to  deny 
it  than  Simon  Peter  to  deny  his  Lord.  But  the  times 
had  changed  since  he  wrote  "  Social  Statics."  From 
an  unknown  man,  printing  with  difficulty  an  unsal- 


LETTER   TO   THE   ST.  JAMES's    GAZETTE.  85 

able  book,  he  had  become  a  popular  philosopher,  to 
whom  all  gratifications  of  sense,  as  of  intellect,  were 
open.i  He  had  tasted  the  sweets  of  London  society, 
and  in  the  United  States,  from  which  he  had  just 
returned,  had  been  hailed  as  a  thinker  beside  whom 
Newton  and  Aristotle  were  to  be  mentioned  only  to 
point  his  superiority.  And,  while  the  fire  in  the  hall 
of  the  High  Priest  was  warm  and  pleasant,  "society" 
had  become  suddenly  aroused  to  rage  against  those 
who  questioned  private  property  in  land.  So  when 
the  St.  James's  and  the  Edinburgh,  both  of  them 
chosen  organs  of  Sir  John  and  his  Grace,  accused 
Herbert  Spencer  of  being  one  of  these,  it  was  to  him 
like  the  voices  of  the  accusing  damsels  to  Peter. 
Fearing,  too,  that  he  might  be  thrust  out  in  the  cold, 
he,  too,  sought  refuge  in  an  alibi. 

1  His  recreations  have  been  systematic  —  concerts,  operas, 
theatres,  billiards,  salmon-fishing,  yachting,  city  rambles,  and 
country  excursions;  and  it  has  been  his  fixed  rule,  when  work  grew 
burdensome,  to  strike  his  tasks  abruptly  and  go  away  for  pleasure 
and  amuse  himself  till  work  itself  again  became  attractive  and 
enjoyable. — Preface,  by  Professor  E.  L.  Yotimans,  to  '^Herbert 
Spencer  on  the  Americans  and  the  Americans  on  Herbert  Spencer, 
being  a  full  report  of  his  interview  and  of  the  proceedings  at  the 
Farewell  Banquet  of  Nov.  9,  1882."  New  York :  D.  Apple- 
ton  &  Co. 


CHAPTER  II. 

"THE   MAN    VERSUS  THE   STATE." 

Mr.  Spencer's  letter  to  the  St.  James's  Gazette 
seems  to  have  produced  the  effect  he  intended,  and 
though  in  the  United  States,  D.  Appleton  &  Co.  con- 
tinued to  advertise  and  sell  "  Social  Statics,"  and  to 
send  to  Mr.  Spencer  his  royalties  upon  it ;  ^  in  Eng- 
land, Sir  John  and  his  Grace  were  satisfied  that  he 
had  been  much  maligned  by  garbled  extracts  from 
an  early  work  that  he  had  since  suppressed. 

But  Mr.  Spencer  himself  seems  to  have  felt  that 
to  make  his  position  among  the  adherents  of  the 
House  of  Have  quite  comfortable,  he  must  do  some- 
thing positive  as  well  as  negative.  So  we  find  his 
next  work  to  be  one  which  the  Liberty  and  Property 
Defence  League,  a  society  formed  in  London  for 
defending  private  property  in  land,  have  ever  since 
been  active  in  pushing. 

In  1884  Mr.  Spencer  issued  four  magazine  articles, 
"  The  New  Toryism,"  "  The  Coming  Slavery,"  "  The 
Sins  of  Legislators,"  and  "  The  Great  Political  Su- 
perstition," which  were  then  published  in  a  volume 
entitled  "  The  Man  versus  the  State,"  and  have  since 

1  The  American  people  have  returned  the  compliment  by  pur- 
chasing more  than  a  hundred  thousand  of  his  books  reprinted  in 
this  country,  and  upon  every  volume  of  Avhich  he  has  been  paid  as 
if  he  had  been  an  American  author.  —  Professor  E.  L.  Youmans  : 
"Herbert  Spencer  on  the  Americans  and  the  Ainericans  on 
Herbert  Spencer." 


"THE   MAN    VERSUS   THE   STATE."  87 

been"  used  (1892)  to  fill  out  the  revised  edition  of 
"  Social  Statics." 

These  essays  are  strongly  individualistic,  condemn- 
ing even  bitterly  any  use  of  governmental  powers  or 
funds  to  regulate  the  conditions  of  labor  or  alleviate 
the  evils  of  poverty.  In  this  Mr.  Spencer  was  continu- 
ing and  accentuating  a  line  begun  in  "  Social  Statics," 
and,  in  the  view  of  those  who  think  as  I  do,  was  in  the 
main  right ;  for  governmental  interferences  and  regu- 
lations and  bonuses  are  in  their  nature  restrictions 
on  freedom,  and  cannot  cure  evils  that  primarily  flow 
from  denials  of  freedom. 

But  what  in  these  essays  marks  a  new  departure, 
what  makes  their  individualism  as  short-sighted  as 
socialism,  and  brutal  as  well,  is  that  they  assume  that 
nothing  at  all  is  needed,  in  the  nature  either  of  palli- 
ative or  remedy  ;  that  they  utterly  ignore  tlie  primary 
Avrong  from  which  proceed  the  evils  that  socialism 
blindly  protests  against.  In  them  Mr.  Spencer  is  like 
one  who  might  insist  that  each  should  swim  for  him- 
self in  crossing  a  river,  ignoring  the  fact  that  some 
had  been  artificially  provided  with  corks  and  others 
artificially  loaded  with  lead.  He  is  like  the  preachers 
who  thundered  to  slaves,  "  Thou  shalt  not  steal !  "  but 
had  no  whisper  against  the  theft  involved  in  their 
enslavement. 

The  burden  of  these  essays  is,  "  If  any  would  not 
work,  neither  should  he  eat  I  "  This  is  declared  to  be 
a  tenet  of  the  Christian  religion,  justified  by  science, 
as  indeed,  though  much  ignored  by  Christians  and  by 
scientists,  it  is. 

To  whom  does  Mr.  Spencer  refer  as  the  idlers  who 
yet  eat? 


SS  IlErUDlATiON. 

"  Why,  of  course,"  tlie  reader  of  "  Social  Statics  " 
would  say,  "he  refers  to  Sir  John  and  his  Grace, 
and  to  the  land-holding  dukes  to  whom  in  '  Social 
Statics  '  he  refers  by  name  —  to  them  and  their  class, 
pre-eminently.  For  they  never  work,  and  take  pride 
that  their  fathers  and  grandfathers  and  great>-grand- 
fathers  never  worked.  Yet  they  eat,  whoever  else 
goes  hungry,  and  that  of  the  best." 

But  the  reader  of  "  Social  Statics "  would  be 
wrong.  Mr.  Spencer  does  not  refer  to  them,  nor 
allude  to  them,  nor  seem  to  think  of  them.  The 
people  on  whom  he  would  enforce  the  command  "  If 
any  would  not  work,  neither  should  he  eat  I "  are 
not  the  fashionable  idlers,  whose  only  occupation  is 
to  kill  time  and  "  get  an  appetite,"  but  the  poor  idlers 
who  say  they  have  no  work.  "  Say,  rather,  that  they 
either  refuse  work  or  quickly  turn  themselves  out  of 
it!"  cries  the  indignant  philosopher,  regardless  now 
of  wliat  he  once  insisted  on  —  that  these  men  are  dis- 
inherited ;  robbed  by  unjust  law  of  their  birthright,  of 
their  rightful  share  in  the  element  without  which  no 
man  can  work ;  dependent,  therefore,  on  others  for 
leave  to  work,  and  often  not  getting  that  leave. 

In  1850,  while  condemning  the  socialistic  pallia- 
tives for  poverty,  Mr.  Spencer  at  the  same  time  recog- 
nized the  truth  that  prompts  them.  He  was  not  con- 
tent to  show  the  futility  of  such  attempts  to  assuage 
the  evils  of  undeserved  poverty  without  pointing  out 
the  giant  wrong  from  which  undeserved  poverty 
springs.  He  began  his  enumeration  of  the  evils  of 
over-government,  not  as  now,  by  merely  denouncing 
what  is  done  in  kindly  though  misplaced  efforts  to 
help  the  down-trodden,  but  by  recognizing   the   pri- 


"the  man   versus  the  state."  89 

raary  wrong.     Beginning  this  enumeration  (page  293, 
"  Social  Statics  ")  he  says  : 

As  the  first  item  on  the  list  there  stands  tliat  gigantic 
injustice  inflicted  on  nineteen-twentietlis  of  the  com- 
munity by  the  usurpation  of  tl^e  soil  —  by  the  breach  of 
their  rights  to  the  use  of  the  earth.  For  this  the  civil 
power  is  responsible  —  has  itself  been  a  party  to  the 
aggression  —  has  made  it  legal,  and  still  defends  it  as 
right. 

And  of  the  moral  truth  involved  in  theories  that 
in  "  The  Man  versus  the  State  "  he  unreservedly  de- 
nounces, he  says  ("  Social  Statics,"  pp.  345—46)  : 

Erroneous  as  are  these  poor-law  and  communist  theo- 
ries —  these  assertions  of  a  man's  right  to  a  maintenance 
and  of  his  right  to  have  work  provided  for  him  —  they 
are,  nevertheless,  nearly  related  to  a  truth.  They  are 
unsuccessful  efforts  to  express  the  fact,  that  whoso  is 
born  on  this  planet  of  ours  thereby  obtains  some  inter- 
est in  it  —  may  not  be  summarily  dismissed  again  —  may 
not  have  his  existence  ignored  by  those  in  possession. 
In  other  words,  the}'  are  attempts  to  embody  that  thought 
which  finds  its  legitimate  utterance  in  the  law  —  all  men 
have  equal  rights  to  the  use  of  the  Earth.  The  preva- 
lence of  these  crude  ideas  is  natural  enough.  A  vague 
perception  that  there  is  something  wrong  about  the 
relationship  in  which  the  great  mass  of  mankind  stand 
to  the  soil  and  to  life,  was  sure  eventually  to  grow  up. 
After  getting  from  under  the  grosser  injustice  of  sla- 
very men  could  not  help  beginning  in  course  of  time, 
to  feel  what  a  monstrous  thing  it  was  that  nine  people 
out  of  ten  should  live  in  the  world  on  sufferance,  not 
having  even  standing  room,  save  by  allowance  of  those 
who  claimed  the  earth's  surface.  Could  it  be  right  that 
all  these  human  beings  should  not  only  be  without  claim 
to  the  necessaries  of  life  —  should  not  only  be  denied  the 
use  of  those  elements  from  which  such  necessaries  are 
obtainable  —  but  should  further  be  unable  to  exchange 
their  labor  for  such  necessaries,  except  by  leave  of  their 
more  fortunate  fellows  ?     Could  it  be  that  the  majority 


90  REPUDIATION. 

had  tlius  no  better  title  to  existence  than  one  based  upon 
the  good-will  or  convenience  of  the  minority  ?  Could  it 
be  that  these  landless  men  had  '•  been  mis-sent  to  this 
earth,  where  all  the  seats  were  already  taken  "  ?  Surely 
not.  And  if  not,  how  ought  matters  to  stand  ?  To  all 
which  questions,  now  forced  upon  men's  minds  in  more 
or  less  definite  shapes,  there  come,  amongst  other  answers, 
these  theories  of  a  right  to  a  maintenance  and  a  right  of 
labor.  Whilst,  therefore,  they  must  be  rejected  as  un- 
tenable, we  may  still  recognize  in  them  the  imperfect 
utterance  of  the  moral  sense  in  its  efforts  to  express 
equity. 

The  wrong  done  to  the  people  at  large,  by  robbing 
them  of  their  birthright  —  their  heritage  in  the  earth  — 
is,  indeed,  thought  by  some  a  sufficient  excuse  for  a  poor 
law,  which  is  regarded  by  such  as  an  instrumentality 
for  distributing  com])ensation.  There  is  much  plausi- 
bility in  this  construction  of  the  matter.  But  .  .  .  why 
organize  a  diseased  state  ?  Sometime  or  other  this 
morbid  constitution  of  things,  under  which  the  greater 
part  of  the  body  politic  is  cut  off  from  direct  access  to 
the  source  of  life,  must  be  changed. 

Of  anything  like  this  there  is  in  "  The  Man  versus 
the  State  "  no  word.  Mr.  Spencer  again  takes  up  his 
parable  against  government  interference  ;  but  he  takes 
it  up  with  every  reference  to  the  gigantic  injustice 
inflicted  upon  nineteen-twentieths  of  his  countrymen 
omitted;  with  everything  excluded  that  might  be 
offensive  to  the  rich  and  powerful. 

Nor  does  he  shrink  from  misrepresenting  those  who 
stand  for  the  truth  he  has  now  virtually,  tliough  not 
openly,  abandoned.  In  his  letter  to  the  *S'^.  James's 
G-azette  he  declared  that  he  had  not  read  my  work ; 
but  in  "The  Coming  Slavery"  occurs  this: 

Communistic  theories,  partially  indorsed  by  one  Act 
of  Parliament  after  another,  and  tacitly  if  not  avowedly 
favored  by  numerous  public  men  seeking  supporters,  are 


"THE   MAN    VERSUS   THE   STATE."  91 

being  advocated  more  and  more  vociferously  by  popular 
leaders,  and  urged  on  by  organized  societies.  There  is 
the  movement  for  land  nationalization  which,  aiming  at 
a  system  of  land-tenure,  equitable  in  the  abstract,  is,  as 
all  the  world  knows,  pressed  by  Mr.  George  and  his 
friends  with  avowed  disregard  for  the  just  claims  of 
existing  owners,  and  as  the  basis  of  a  scheme  going 
more  than  half-way  to  state-socialism. 

And  in  "  The  Sins  of  Legislators  "  this  : 

And  now  this  doctrine  [that  societ}^  as  a  whole  has  an 
absolute  right  over  the  possessions  of  each  member], 
which  has  been  tacitly  assumed,  is  being  openly  pro- 
claimed. Mr.  George  and  his  friends,  Mr.  Hyndman  and 
his  supporters,  are  pushing  the  theory  to  its  logical  issue. 
They  have  been  instructed  by  examples,  yearly  increas- 
ing in  number,  that  the  individual  has  no  rights  but 
what  the  community  may  equitably  over-ride ;  and  they 
are  now  saying  —  "  It  shall  go  hard,  but  we  will  better 
the  instruction,  and  abolish  individual  rights  altogether." 

Chai'ity  requires  the  assumption  that  when  Mr. 
Spencer  wrote  these  passages  he  had  not  read  anything 
I  had  written ;  and  that  up  to  the  present  time  when 
he  has  again  reprinted  them  he  has  not  done  so. 

For  in  nothing  I  have  ever  written  or  spoken  is  there 
any  justification  for  such  a  characterization.  I  am  not 
even  a  land  nationalizationist,  as  the  English  and  Ger- 
man and  Australian  land  nationalizationists  well  know. 
I  have  never  advocated  the  taking  of  land  by  the  state 
or  the  holding  of  land  by  the  state,  further  than 
needed  for  public  use  ;  still  less  the  working  of  land 
by  the  state.  From  my  first  word  on  the  subject  I 
have  advocated  what  has  come  to  be  widely  known 
as  "  the  single  tax ; "  i.e.,  the  raising  of  public  revenues 
by  taxation  on  the  value  of  land  irrespective  of  the 
improvements  on  it  —  taxation  which,  as  fast  as  pes- 


92  REPUDIATION. 

sible  and  as  far  as  practicable,  should  be  made  to 
absorb  economic  rent  and  take  the  place  of  all  other 
taxes.  And  among  the  reasons  I  have  always  urged 
for  this  has  been  the  simplification  of  government 
and  the  doing  away  of  the  injustice  of  which  govern- 
ments are  guilty  in  taking  from  individuals  property 
that  rightfully  belongs  to  the  individual.  I  have  not 
gone  so  far  as  Mr.  Spencer  in  limiting  the  functions 
of  government,  for  I  believe  that  whatever  becomes 
a  necessary  monopoly  becomes  a  function  of  the 
state ;  and  that  the  sphere  of  government  begins 
where  the  freedom  of  competition  ends,  since  in  no 
other  way  can  equal  liberty  be  assured.  But  within 
this  line  I  have  always  opposed  governmental  inter- 
ference. I  have  been  an  active,  consistent,  and  abso- 
lute free-trader,  and  an  opponent  of  all  schemes  that 
would  limit  the  freedom  of  the  individual.  I  have 
been  a  stauncher  denier  of  the  assumption  of  the  right 
of  society  to  the  possessions  of  each  member,  and  a 
clearer  and  more  resolute  upholder  of  the  rights  of 
property  than  has  Mr.  Spencer.  I  have  opposed  every 
proposition  to  help  the  poor  at  the  expense  of  the 
rich.  I  have  always  insisted  that  no  man  should  be 
taxed  because  of  his  wealth,  and  that  no  matter  how 
many  millions  a  man  might  rightfully  get,  society 
should  leave  to  him  every  penny  of  them. 

All  this  would  have  been  evident  to  Mr.  Spencer 
if  he  had  read  any  one  of  my  books  before  writing 
about  me.  But  he  evidently  prefers  the  easier  method 
which  Parson  Wilbur,  in  Lowell's  "Biglow  Papers," 
was  accustomed  to  take  with  "a  print  called  the  Lib- 
erator^ whose  heresies,"  he  said,  "  I  take  every  proper 
opportunity  of  combating,  and  of  which,  I  thank 
God,  I  have  never  read  a  single  line." 


"THE  MAN    VERSUS  THE   STATE."  93 

To  do  him  justice,  I  do  not  think  Mr.  Spencer  liad 
any  desire  to  misrepresent  me.  He  was  prompted  to 
it  by  the  impulse  that  always  drives  men  to  abuse 
those  who  adhere  to  a  cause  they  have  betrayed,  as 
the  readiest  way  of  assuring  Sir  John  and  his  Grace 
that  no  proposal  to  disturb  their  rentals  would  in 
the  future  come  from  him. 

Another  thing,  however,  is  to  be  noticed  here  — 
the  admission  that  the  movement  for  land  nationaliza- 
tion is  "  aiming  at  a  system  of  land-tenure  equitable 
in  the  abstract."  Mr.  Spencer  has  not  reached  the 
point  of  utterly  denying  the  truth  he  had  seen.  The 
abolition  of  private  property  in  land  he  still  admits 
is  equitable  in  the  abstract. 

•  Now,  what  is  meant  by  equitable  in  the  abstract  ? 
Let  "  Social  Statics,"  i^age  64,  tell  us  : 

For  what  does  a  man  really  mean  by  saying  of  a  thing 
that  it  is  "theoretically  just,"  or  "true  in  principle,"  or 
"  abstractedly  right "  ?  Simply  that  it  accords  with 
what  he,  in  some  way  or  other,  perceives  to  be  the  estab- 
lished arrangements  of  Divine  rule.  When  he  admits 
that  an  act  is  "  theoretically  just,"  he  admits  it  to  be 
that  which,  in  strict  duty,  should  be  done.  By  "  true 
in  principle,"  he  means  in  harmony  with  the  conduct 
decreed  for  us.  The  course  which  he  calls  "  abstractedly 
right,"  lie  believes  to  be  the  appointed  way  to  human 
happiness.  There  is  no  escape.  The  expressions  mean 
this,  or  they  mean  nothing. 


CHAPTER  III. 

LETTER   TO   THE    TIMES. 

No  one  can  boldly  utter  a  great  truth,  and  then, 
when  the  times  have  become  ripe  for  it,  and  his 
utterance  voices  what  is  burning  in  hearts  and  con- 
sciences, whisper  it  away.  So  despite  his  apology 
to  landlords  in  the  *S'^  James's  Gazette,  and  the  pains 
he  had  taken  to  make  his  peace  with  them  in  "  The 
Man  versus  the  State,"  what  he  had  said  on  the  land 
question  in  "Social  Statics"  came  up  again  to  trouble 
Mr.  Spencer. 

But  for  a  long  time  his  position  on  the  land  ques- 
tion was  almost  as  dual  as  that  of  Dr.  Jekyll  and 
Mr.  Hyde.  In  his  personal  circle  it  was  doubtless 
assumed  that  he  was  a  staunch  supporter  of  private 
property  in  land,  and  if  his  earlier  opinions  were 
known  there  it  was  understood  that  he  was  sorry  for 
them.  And  he  had  become,  if  not  an  active  member, 
at  least  a  valued  ally  of  the  Liberty  and  Property 
Defence  League.  But  in  a  wider  circle  what  he  had 
written  against  private  property  in  land  was  telling 
with  increasing  force.  For  to  this  wider  circle  his  St. 
James''s  apology  had  hardly  reached,  and  even  when 
known  was  not  deemed  a  recantation  of  tlie  opinions 
deliberately  expressed  in  "  Social  Statics,"  which  he 
still,  through  D.  Appleton  &  Co.,  continued  to  pub- 
lish, without  any  modification  whatever.    The  steady 


LETTER   TO  THE   TIMES.  95 

growth  of  the  movement  that  began  with  the  publica- 
tion of  "Progress  and  Poverty  "  everywhere  enlisted 
active  men  in  the  propagation  of  the  idea  of  the 
equality  of  rights  to  land  and  called  wide  attention 
to  what  he  had  said  on  that  subject.  They  naturally 
seized  on  the  argument  against  the  justice  of  private 
jDroperty  in  land  in  Chapter  IX.  of  "  Social  Statics," 
and  spread  it  broadcast,  as  the  utterance  of  one  now 
widely  esteemed  the  greatest  of  philosophers.  Of  all 
else  that  Mr.  Spencer  has  written,  there  is  nothing 
that  has  had  such  a  circulation  as  has  thus  been 
given  to  this  chapter.  It  was  printed  and  is  still 
being  printed  by  many  American  newspapers,^  and 
was  issued  in  tract  form  for  free  distribution  in  the 
United  States,  Canada  and  Australia ;  editions  of  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  being  issued  at  a  time,^  many  of 
which  must  have  reached  Great  Britain,  even  if  it  was 
not  reprinted  there. 

This  w4de  circulation  of  his  condemnation  of 
private  property  in  land  did  not,  it  is  probable,  much 
trouble  Mr.  Sjiencer,  since  it  did  not  reach  his  Lon- 
don circle.  But  in  November,  1889  —  six  years 
after  his  letter  to  the  St.  James's  Gazette  — ■  some 
echoes  of  it  made  their  way  into  the  Times,  the  very 
journalistic  centre  of  high  English  respectability. 

The  matter  thus  got  into  the  Times:  Mr.  John 
INlorley,  Member  of  Parliament  for  Newcastle,  being 

^  Even  as  I  write  I  am  constantly  receiving,  especially  from  the 
West,  copies  of  papers  which  contain  Chapter  IX.  of  "Social 
Statics,"  and  which  in  ignorance  of  all  he  has  since  said,  continue 
to  speak  of  Mr.  Spencer  as  an  advocate  of  equal  rights  to  land. 

2  About  the  time  I  ran  for  Mayor  of  New  York  (1886)  on  a 
platform  which  attracted  great  attention  to  the  idea  of  equal  rights 
to  land,  one  enthusiastic  advocate  of  the  idea,  Mr.  W.  J.  Atkinson, 
himself  printed  some  500,00U  copies. 


9G  REPUDIATION. 

in  that  city,  was  interviewed  by  some  of  his  con- 
stituents, representing  a  labor  organization.  Among 
other  questions  land  nationalization  was  brought  up ; 
Mr.  John  Laidler,  a  bricklayer,  speaking  for  it.  Mr. 
Morley  expressing  dissent,  Mr.  Laidler  cited  the 
authority  of  Mr.  Spencer  in  support  of  the  ideas  that 
land  had  been  made  private  property  by  force  and 
fraud,  and  should  be  appropriated  by  the  community 
for  the  benefit  of  all.  The  Times  of  November  5th 
contained  a  report  of  this  interview. 

This  report  in  the  Times  aroused  Mr.  Spencer  at 
once.  For  although  he  had  no  objection  to  the  cir- 
culation of  his  radical  utterances  in  America,  where 
through  D.  Appleton  &  Co.  he  was  still  publishing 
and  advertising  "  Social  Statics,"  it  was  evidently 
quite  a  different  matter  to  him  that  they  should  be 
known  in  the  pleasant  circle  wherein  with  Sir  John 
and  his  Grace  and  the  peers  and  judges  of  the 
Liberty  and  Property  Defence  League  he  was  per- 
sonally dwelling.  He  promptly  sent  this  letter  to  the 
Times.     It  appeared  on  the  7th. 

To  the  Editor  of  the  Times. 

SiK :  During  the  interview  between  Mr.  Morley  and 
some  of  his  constituents,  reported  in  your  issue  of  the 
6th  inst.,  I  was  referred  to  as  having  set  forth  certain 
opinions  respecting  land  ownership.  Fearing  that,  if  I 
remain  silent,  many  will  suppose  I  have  said  things 
which  I  have  not  said,  I  find  it  needful  to  say  something 
in  explanation. 

Already  within  these  few  years  I  have  twice  pointed  o\it 
that  these  opinions  (made  to  appear  by  those  who  have 
circulated  them  widely  different  from  what  they  really 
are,  by  the  omission  of  accompanying  opinions)  were 
set  forth  in  my  first  work,  published  forty  years  ago ; 
and  that,  for  the  last  twelve  or  fifteen  years,  I  have 
refrained  from  issuing  new  editions  of  that  work  and 


LETTER   TO   THE  TIMES.  97 

have  interdicted  translations,  because,  though  I  still 
adhere  to  its  general  principles,  I  dissent  from  some  of 
the  deductions. 

The  work  referred  to  —  "Social  Statics"  —  was  in- 
tended to  be  a  system  of  political  ethics  —  absolute 
political  ethics,  or  that  which  ought  to  be,  as  distinguished 
from  relative  political  ethics,  or  that  Avhich  is  at  present 
the  nearest  practicable  approach  to  it.  The  conclusion 
reached  concerning  land  ownership  was  reached  while 
seeking  a  valid  basis  for  the  right  of  property,  the  basis 
assigned  by  Locke  appearing  to  me  invalid.  It  was 
argued  that  a  satisfactory  ethical  warrant  for  private 
ownership  could  arise  only  by  contract  between  the 
community,  as  original  owner  of  the  inhabited  area,  and 
individual  members,  who  became  tenants,  agreeing  to 
pay  certain  portions  of  the  produce,  or  its  equivalent  in 
money,  in  consideration  of  recognized  claims  to  the  rest. 
And  in  the  course  of  the  argument  it  was  pointed  out 
that  such  a  view  of  land  ownership  is  congruous  with 
existing  legal  theory  and  practice ;  since  in  law  every 
land-owner  is  held  to  be  a  tenant  of  the  Crown  —  that  is, 
of  the  community,  and  since,  in  practice,  the  supreme 
right  of  the  community  is  asserted  by  every  Act  of 
Parliament  Avhich,  with  a  view  to  public  advantage, 
directly  or  by  proxy  takes  possession  of  land  after  making 
due  compensation. 

All  this  was  said  in  the  belief  that  the  questions  raised 
were  not  likely  to  come  to  the  front  in  our  time  or  for 
many  generations  ;  but,  assuming  that  they  would  some- 
time come  to  the  front,  it  was  said  that,  supposing 
the  community  should  assert  overtly  the  supreme  right 
which  is  now  tacitly  asserted,  the  business  of  compensa- 
tion of  land-owners  would  be  a  complicated  one  — 

One  that  perhaps  cannot  be  settled  in  a  strictly  equitable 
manner.  .  .  .  Most  of  our  present  land-owners  are  men  who  have, 
either  mediately  or  immediately,  either  by  their  own  acts  or  by  the 
acts  of  their  ancestors,  given  for  their  estates  equivalents  of  honestly 
earned  wealth,  believing  that  they  were  investing  their  savings  in  a 
legitimate  manner.  To  justly  estimate  and  liquidate  the  claims  of 
such  is  one  of  the  most  intricate  problems  society  will  one  day  have 
to  solve. 

To  make  the  position  I  then  took  quite  clear,  it  is 
needful  to  add  that,  as  shown  in  a  succeeding  chapter, 


98  REPUDIATION. 

the  insistence  on  this  doctrine,  in  virtue  of  wliich  "  the 
right  of  property  obtains  a  legitimate  foundation,"  had 
for  one  of  its  motives  the  exclusion  of  Socialism  and 
Communism,  to  which  I  was  then  as  profoundly  averse 
as  I  am  now. 

Investigations  made  during  recent  years  into  the 
various  forms  of  social  organization,  while  writing  the 
"  Principles  of  Sociology,"  have  in  part  confirmed  and  in 
part  changed  the  views  published  in  1850.  Perhaps  I 
may  be  allowed  space  for  quoting  from  "Political 
Institutions  "  a  paragraph  showing  the  revised  conclu- 
sions arrived  at : 

At  first  sight  it  seems  fairly  inferable  that  the  absolute  owner- 
Bhip  of  land  by  private  persons  must  be  tlie  ultimate  state  which 
industrialism  brings  about.  But  though  industrialism  has  thus  far 
tended  to  individualize  possession  of  land  while  individualizing  all 
other  possession,  it  may  be  doubted  whether  the  final  stage  is  at 
present  reached.  Ownership  established  by  force  does  not  stand 
on  the  same  footing  as  ownership  established  by  contract ;  and 
though  multiplied  sales  and  purchases,  treating  the  two  ownerships 
in  the  same  way,  have  tacitly  assimilated  them,  the  assimilation 
may  eventually  be  denied.  The  analogy  furnished  by  assumed 
rights  of  possession  over  human  beings  helps  vis  to  recognize  this 
possibility.  For,  while  prisoners  of  war,  taken  by  force  and  held 
as  property  in  a  vague  way  (being  at  first  much  on  a  footing  with 
other  members  of  a  household)  were  reduced  more  definitely  to  the 
form  of  property  when  the  buying  and  selling  of  slaves  became 
general ;  and,  while  it  might  centuries  ago  have  been  thence  inferred 
that  the  ownership  of  man  by  man  was  an  ownership  in  course 
of  being  permanently  established,  yet  we  see  that  a  later  stage  of 
civilization,  reversing  this  process,  has  destroyed  ownership  of  man 
by  man.  Similarly,  at  a  stage  still  more  advanced,  it  may  be  that 
private  ownership  of  land  will  disappear.  As  that  primitive  free- 
dom of  the  individual  which  existed  before  war  established  coercive 
institutions  and  personal  slavery  comes  to  be  re-established  as 
militancy  declines,  so  it  seems  possible  that  the  primitive  ownership 
of  land  by  the  comnuuiity,  which,  with  the  development  of  coercive 
institutions,  lapsed  in  large  measure  or  wholly  into  private  owner- 
ship, will  be  revived  as  industrialism  further  develops.  The  regime 
of  contract,  at  present  so  far  extended  that  the  right  of  property  in 
movables  is  recognized  only  as  having  arisen  by  exchange  of  ser- 
vices or  products  under  agreements,  or  by  gift  from  those  who  had 
acquired  it  under  such  agreements,  may  be  further  extended  so  far 
that  the  products  of  the  soil  will  be  recognized  as  property  only  by 
virtue  of  agreements  between  individuals  as  tenants  and  the  com- 
munity as  land-owner.  Even  now,  among  ourselves,  private  owner- 
ship of  land  is  not  absolute.  In  legal  theory  land-owners  are 
directly  or  indirectly  tenants  of  the  Crown  (which  in  our  day  is 


LETTER   TO  THE  TEMES.  99 

equivalent  to  the  state,  or,  in  other  words,  the  community) ;  and 
the  community  from  time  to  time  resumes  possession  after  making 
due  compensation.  Perhaps  tlie  right  of  tlie  community  to  the 
land,  tluis  tacitly  asserted,  will  in  time  to  come  be  overtly  asserted 
and  acted  upon  after  making  full  allowance  for  the  accumulated 
value  artificially  given.  .  .  .  There  is  reason  to  suspect  that,  while 
private  possession  of  things  produced  by  labor  will  grow  even  more 
definite  and  sacred  than  at  present,  the  inhabited  area,  which  can- 
not be  produced  by  labor,  will  eventually  be  distinguished  as  some- 
thing which  may  not  be  privately  possessed.  As  the  individual, 
primitively  owner  of  himself,  partially  or  wholly  loses  ownership  of 
himself  during  the  militant  regime,  but  graduallj'  resumes  it  as  the 
industrial  regime  develops,  so  possibly  the  communal  proprietor- 
ship of  land,  partially  or  wholly  merged  in  the  ownership  of  domi- 
nant men  during  evolution  of  the  militant  type,  will  be  resumed  as 
the  industrial  type  becomes  fully  evolved  (pp.  643-640). 

The  use  of  the  words  "possible,"  ''possibly,"  and 
"perhaps"  in  the  above  extracts  shows  that  I  have  no 
positive  opinion  as  to  what  may  hereafter  take  place. 
The  reason  for  this  state  of  hesitancy  is  that  I  cannot 
see  my  way  toward  reconciliation  of  the  ethical  require- 
ments with  the  politico-economical  requirements.  On 
the  one  hand,  a  condition  of  things  under  which  the 
owner  of,  say,  the  Scilly  Isles  might  make  tenancy  of 
his  land  conditional  upon  professing  a  certain  creed  or 
adopting  prescribed  habits  of  life,  giving  notice  to  quit 
to  any  who  did  not  submit,  is  ethically  indefensible. 
On  the  other  hand,  "  nationalization  of  the  land,"  effected 
after  compensation  for  the  artificial  value  given  by  culti- 
vation, amounting  to  the  greater  part  of  its  value,  would 
entail,  in  the  shape  of  interest  on  the  required  purchase- 
money,  as  great  a  sum  as  is  now  paid  in  rent,  and  indeed 
a  greater,  considering  the  respective  rates  of  interest 
on  landed  property  and  other  property.  Add  to  which, 
there  is  no  reason  to  think  that  the  substituted  form  of 
aduainistration  would  be  better  than  the  existing  form 
of  administration.  The  belief  that  land  w^ould  be  better 
managed  by  public  officials  than  it  is  by  private  owners 
is  a  very  wild  belief. 

What  the  remote  future  may  bring  forth  there  is  no 
saying;  but  with  a  humanity  anything  like  that  we  now 
know,  the  implied  reorganization  would  be  disastrous. 
I  am,  etc.,         Herbert  Spencer. 

Athen^um  Club,  Nov.  6. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THIS   APOLOGY   EXAMINED. 

To  drop  into  one  of  Mr.  Spencer's  favorite  methods 
of  illustration  : 

"I  am  told,"  said  the  respectable  grandmother, 
with  a  big  stick  in  her  hand,  "  that  you  are  the  boy 
who  broke  down  my  fence  and  told  all  the  other  boys 
that  they  were  at  liberty  to  go  into  my  orchard  and 
take  my  aj^ples." 

"  It  is  not  true,"  replied  the  trembling  small  boy ; 
"  I  didn't  do  it.  And  I  didn't  mean  to  do  it.  And 
when  I  did  it  I  was  only  trying  to  mend  your  fence, 
which  I  found  Avas  weak.  And  the  reason  I  did  it 
was  to  keep  bad  boys  out.  And  I  have  always  said 
you  ought  to  be  paid  for  your  apples.  And  I  won't 
do  it  again !  And  I  am  certain  your  apples  would 
give  boys  stomach-ache." 

This  letter  to  the  Times  repeats  the  same  line  of 
excuse  made  six  years  before  in  the  St.  James's 
Gazette.  Emboldened  by  the  success  of  that  apol- 
ogy, for  no  one  seems  to  have  thought  it  worth  while 
to  point  out  its  misstatements,  Mr.  Spencer  under- 
takes to  face  down  the  Newcastle  bricklayer  in  the 
same  way,  and  with  even  bolder  crookedness. 

The  question  in  issue  is  a  question  of  fact  — 
whether,  as  asserted  by  Mr.  Laidler,  Mr.  Spencer  had 
in  "  Social  Statics "  advocated  land  nationalization, 
and  incidentally,  whether  he  had  declared  that  the 


THIS   APOLOGY    EXAMINED.  101 

land  had  been  made  private  property  by  force  and 
fraud.  Without  venturing  specifically  to  deny  this, 
Mr.  Spencer  denies  it  by  implication,  and  gives  an 
impression  thus  expressed  editorially  by  the  Times 
on  the  9th  of  November : 

So  without  denying  that  he  did  once  say  something  of 
the  sort,  he  (Mr.  Spencer)  explains  that  it  was  forty 
years  ago,  and  that  for  the  last  fifteen  years  he  has  been 
doing  all  that  he  can  to  suppress  the  book  in  which  he 
said  it,  and  that  he  never  meant  his  words  to  have  any 
bearing  upon  practical  questions. 

Put  into  straightforward  English,  what  Mr.  Spencer 
says  in  this  letter  to  the  Times  is  — 

That  he  had  not  favored  land  nationalization. 

That  he  had  been  made  to  appear  to  have  done  so 
by  quotations  from  "  Social  Statics  "  divested  of  their 
qualifying  context. 

That  for  the  last  twelve  or  fifteen  years  he  had 
stopped  the  publication  of  that  work. 

That  "  Social  Statics  "  was  not  intended  to  suggest 
practical  political  action. 

That  what  was  said  therein  of  land-ownership  was 
said  in  the  effort  to  find  a  valid  basis  for  the  right  of 
property,  and  to  exclude  socialism  and  communism ; 
that  it  involved  no  departure  from  the  existing  legal 
theory  and  practice ;  was  said  in  the  belief  that  the 
land  question  would  not  come  to  the  front  for  many 
generations,  and  admitted  the  right  of  the  land-owners 
to  compensation. 

That  his  present  conclusions  are,  that  while  pos- 
sibly the  community  may  some  time  resume  land  after 
due  compensation  to  land-owners,  he  has  no  positive 
opinion  as  to  whether  it  will  or  not. 


102  REPUDIATION. 

That  as  to  this  he  cannot  harmonize  ethics  with 
political  economy,  for  while  a  condition  may  be  im- 
agined under  which  private  land  ownership  might  be 
injurious,  its  abolition  would  require  the  payment  to 
land-owners  of  as  great  and  indeed  a  greater  sum  than 
is  now  paid  in  rent ;  would  involve  the  management 
of  land  by  public  officials,  and  that  with  humanity 
anything  like  that  we  now  know,  this  would  be  dis- 
astrous. 

All  this,  so  far  as  it  relates  to  the  question  in  issue, 
is  simply  not  true. 

Mr.  Spencer,  in  "  Social  Statics,"  did  condemn  pri- 
vate property  in  land,  did  advocate  the  resumj)tion  of 
land  by  the  community,  did  unequivocally  and  unre- 
servedly, and  with  all  his  force,  declare  for  what  is 
now  called  land-nationalization.  That  he  did  so  does 
not  rest  on  any  forcing  of  words,  any  wresting  of 
sentences  from  their  context.  It  is  the  burden  of  all 
he  says  on  the  subject,  and  of  the  most  vital  part  of 
the  book.  In  the  whole  volume  there  is  no  word  in 
modification  of  the  opinions  so  strongly  and  clearly 
expressed  in  the  full  quotations  I  have  made. 

Nor  is  it  true  that  the  conclusion  of  "Social  Statics" 
concerning  land  ownership  "  was  reached  while  seek 
ing  a  valid  basis  for  the  right  of  property."  It  was 
reached  as  a  primar}^  corollary  of  the  first  principle : 
the  freedom  of  every  man  to  do  all  that  he  wills  pro- 
vided he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other 
man,  and  was  deduced  directly  from  the  facts  of 
human  existence : 

Given  a  race  of  beings  having  like  claims  to  pursue 
the  objects  of  their  desires  —  given  a  world  adapted  to 
the  gratification  of  those  desires  —  a  Avorld  into  which 


THIS    APOLOGY    EXAMINED.  103 

such  beings  are  similarly  born,  and  it  unavoidably  fol- 
lows that  they  have  equal  rights  to  the  use  of  this  world. 

Mr.  Spencer's  questioning  of  Locke's  derivation  of 
the  right  of  property,  so  far  from  being  the  cause  of 
his  denial  of  tlie  validity  of  private  property  in  land, 
grows,  as  we  have  seen,  out  of  his  idea  that  the  only 
right  to  land  is  that  of  the  community.  What  he  has 
to  say  against  socialism  and  communism,  instead  of 
being  a  motive  for  his  advocacy  of  land  nationaliza- 
tion, is  brought  in  to  strengthen  land  nationalization 
by  showing  that  it  does  not  involve  either.  And  so, 
what  Mr.  Spencer  gives  the  Times  to  understand  as 
to  the  congruity  of  the  view  of  land  ownership  taken 
in  "  Social  Statics "  with  existing  legal  theory  and 
practice,  is  so  flagrantly  untrue  that  one  wonders  at 
its  audacity. 

As  to  what  Mr.  Spencer  says  of  the  intent  of 
"Social  Statics,"  the  only  intelligible  meaning  that 
can  be  put  on  it  is  that  which  the  editor  of  the  Times 
put,  "That  he  never  meant  his  words  to  have  any- 
bearing  upon  practical  questions." 

The  exact  phraseology  is  — 

The  work  referred  to  —  ''  Social  Statics  "  —  was  in- 
tended to  be  a  system  of  Political  Ethics  —  absolute 
l)olitical  etnics,  or  that  which  ought  to  be,  as  distin- 
guished from  relative  political  ethics,  or  that  which  is 
at  present  the  nearest  practical  approach  to  it. 

If  this  means  anything,  it  means  that  "  Social 
Statics  "  was  written  to  set  forth  a  system  of  political 
ethics  that  cannot  be  carried  into  conduct  now,  and 
that  no  one  is  under  any  obligation  to  try  to  carry 
into  conduct. 


104  HEPUDIATION. 

The  applications  of  etliics,  like  the  applications  of 
mechanics,  or  chemistry,  or  any  other  science  or  body 
of  laws,  must  always  be  relative,  in  the  sense  that  one 
principle  or  law  is  to  be  taken  in  consideration  with 
other  principles  or  laws  :  so  that  conduct  that  would 
have  the  sanction  of  ethics  where  one  is  beset  by 
robbers  or  murderers  might  be  very  different  from  the 
conduct  that  etliics  would  sanction  under  normal  and 
peaceful  conditions.  In  the  "  Data  of  Ethics,"  one 
of  the  more  recent  of  the  works  which  set  forth  the 
Spencerian  Philosophy,  written  long  after  "  Social 
Statics,"  this  distinction  between  pure  ethics  and 
applied  ethics  is,  by  one  of  the  confusions  that  in 
that  pliilosophy  pass  for  definitions,  converted  into  a 
distinction  between  absolute  ethics  and  relative  ethics. 
Yet,  if  there  be  any  sort  of  etliics  that  has  no  rela- 
tion to  conduct  here  and  now,  the  best  term  for  it  is 
Pickwickian  ethics. 

But  the  question  here  is  not  a  question  of  defini- 
tion.    It  is  a  question  of  fact. 

Now,  however  Mr.  Spencer's  opinions  and  wishes 
may  have  changed  since  "  Social  Statics  "  was  writ- 
ten, that  book  still  shows  that,  tvheji  he  wrote  it,  his 
intention  in  exposing  the  iniquity  of  private  property 
in  land  was  to  arouse  public  opinion  to  demand  its 
abolition.  In  "  Social  Statics "  he  denounced  not 
only  private  property  in  land :  he  denounced  slavery, 
then  in  the  United  States  and  other  countries,  a  still- 
living  thing ;  he  denounced  protection ;  he  denounced 
restrictions  on  the  right  of  free  speech,  the  denial 
to  women  of  equal  rights,  the  coercive  education  of 
children,  the  then  existing  restrictions  on  the  fran- 
chise, the  cost  and  delays  of  legal  proceedings,  the 


THIS   APOLOGY   EXAMINED,  105 

maintenance  of  poor  laws,  the  establishment  of  state 
schools,  government  colonization,  etc.  Were  all 
these  pleas  for  reforms,  some  of  which  Mr.  Spencer 
has  lived  to  see  accomplished,  and  others  of  which  he 
is  still  advocating,  Pickwickian  also  ? 

If  Mr.  Spencer,  in  what  he  had  to  say  on  the  land 
qnestion  in  "  Social  Statics,"  was  talking  mere  ab- 
stract political  ethics  —  something  totally  different 
from  practical  ethics  —  what  did  he  mean  by  declar- 
ing tliat  "  Equity  does  not  permit  property  in  land  "  ? 
What  did  he  mean  by  saying  that  pure  equity 
"  enjoins  a  protest  against  every  existing  pretension 
to  the  individual  possession  of  the  soil,  and  dictates 
the  assertion  that  the  right  of  mankind  at  large  to 
the  earth's  surface  is  still  valid  —  all  deeds,  customs, 
and  laws  notwithstanding  "  ?  What  did  he  mean  by 
scornfully  sneering  at  those  who  "  are  continually 
trying  to  reconcile  yes  and  no,"  and  who  delight 
"  in  ifs,  buts,  and  excepts  "  ?  What  did  he  mean  by 
saying,  "  In  this  matter  of  land-tenure  the  verdict  of 
morality  must  be  either  yea  or  nay.  Either  men 
have  a  right  to  make  the  soil  private  property  or 
they  have  not.  There  is  no  medium  "  ?  What  did  he 
mean  in  pointing  out  that  what  is  now  called  land 
nationalization  "  need  cause  no  very  serious  revolu- 
tion in  existing  arrangements,"  and  that  "  equity 
sternly  commands  it  to  be  done "  ?  What  did  he 
mean  by  putting,  "  as  the  first  item  on  the  list "  of 
the  injuries  which  government  at  the  time  he  wrote 
was  doing,  "  that  gigantic  injustice  inflicted  on  nine- 
teen-twentieths  of  the  community  by  the  usurpation 
of  the  soil  —  by  the  breach  of  their  rights  to  the  use 
of  the  earth "  ?     What  did  lie  mean  by  saying  that 


106  KEPUDIATION. 

the  only  plausible  defence  of  the  poor  laws  was 
"  the  wrong  done  to  people  at  large  by  robbing  them 
of  their  birthright  —  their  heritage  in  the  earth  "  — 
by  asking,  ''  Why  organize  a  diseased  state  ?  "  —  by 
declaring,  "  Some  time  or  other  this  morbid  constitu- 
tion of  things,  under  which  the  greater  part  of  the 
body  politic  is  cut  off  from  direct  access  to  the  source 
of  life,  must  be  changed." 

Did  it  all  relate  to  the  sort  of  ethics  that  has  no 
bearing  on  j)ractical  questions  ? 

"Whatever  maj^  be  the  ethical  views  of  Mr.  Spencer 
now  that  his  eyes  have  been  23ut  out,  and  he  has  been 
set  to  grind  in  the  house  of  the  lords  of  the  Philis- 
tines, the  young  Samson  of  "  Social  Statics  "  with 
locks  as  yet  unshorn  by  the  social  Delilah  knew  noth- 
ing of  any  such  ethics.  Not  merely  in  what  I  have 
quoted,  but  throughout  the  book,  from  first  page  to 
last,  the  burden  of  "  Social  Statics  "  is  the  necessity, 
the  sacred  duty  of  destroying  abuses  that  fetter  the 
equal  liberty  of  men.  He  sees,  indeed  —  as  who  does 
not  ?  —  that  before  liberty  can  truly  reign  men  must 
be  fit  for  libertj^ ;  and  he  realizes  that  there  may  be 
social  conditions  in  which  liberty  might  temporarily 
work  ill ;  but  he  insists  again  and  again  that  where- 
ever  there  is  au}^  yearning  for  liberty,  any  perception 
of  the  wrong  done  by  its  denial,  there  the  time  has 
come  for  the  struggle  against  injustice  to  be  made, 
and  that  the  way  to  fit  men  for  the  enjoyment  of 
rights  is  to  destroy  wrongs.  The  central  thought 
of  the  book,  that  permeates  all  its  parts,  is  that  of 
a  divinely- appointed  order,  which  men  are  bound 
to  obey  —  a  God-given  law,  as  true  in  the  social 
sphere  as  the  laws  of  physics  are  true  in  the  physi- 


THIS   APOLOGY   EXAMINED.  107 

cal  sphere,  to  which  all  human  regulations  must  be 
made  to  conform;  and  that  this  law  is  the  law  of 
equal  freedom  —  the  law  from  which  is  deduced  the 
condemnation  of  private  property  in  land.  For  those 
who  palter  with  expediency ;  for  those  who  would 
dally  with  wrong ;  for  those  who  say  that  a  thing  is 
right  in  the  abstract,  but  that  practical  considerations 
forbid  its  being  carried  into  effect  —  Mr,  Spencer, 
from  the  first  page  of  "  Social  Statics  "  to  the  last,  has 
nothing  but  the  utmost  contempt  and  scorn. 

Here  is  one  extract  from  the  close  of  the  introduc- 
tion to  "  Social  Statics  (pp.  51,  56,  60-65)  which 
will  show  how  widely  different  were  the  ethics  taught 
in  "  Social  Statics "  from  what  the  author  of  the 
Spencerian  philosophy,  in  1889,  told  the  Times  they 
were : 

And  yet,  unable  as  the  imperfect  man  may  be  to 
fulfil  the  perfect  law,  there  is  no  other  law  for 
him.  One  x\^\\t  course  only  is  open ;  and  he  must 
either  follow  that  or  take  the  consequences.  The  con- 
ditions of  existence  will  not  bend  before  his  perversity ; 
nor  relax  in  consideration  of  his  weakness.  Neither, 
when  they  are  broken,  may  any  exception  from  penal- 
ties be  hoped  for.  "  Obey  or  suffer,"  are  the  ever-repeated 
alternatives.  Disobedience  is  sure  to  be  convicted.  And 
there  are  no  reprieves.  .  .  . 

Our  social  edifice  may  be  constructed  with  all  possible 
labor  and  ingenuity,  and  be  strongly  cramped  together 
with  cunningly-devised  enactments,  but  if  there  be  no 
rectitude  in  its  component  parts  —  if  it  is  not  built  on 
npright  principles,  it  will  assuredly  tumble  to  pieces. 
As  well  might  we  seek  to  light  a  fire  with  ice,  feed  cattle 
on  stones,  hang  our  hats  on  cobwebs,  or  otherwise  disre- 
gard the  physical  laws  of  the  world,  as  go  contrary  to 
its  equally  imperative  ethical  laws. 

Yes,  but  there  are  exceptions,  say  you.  We  cannot 
always  be  strictly  guided  by  abstract  principles.     Pru- 


108  REPUDIATION. 

dential  considerations  must  have  some  weight.  It  is 
necessary  to  use  a  little  policy. 

Very  specious,  no  doubt,  are  your  reasons  for  advocat- 
ing this  or  the  other  exception.  But  if  there  be  any 
truth  in  the  foregoing  argument,  no  infraction  of  the 
law  can  be  made  with  impunity.  Those  cherished 
schemes  by  which  you  propose  to  attain  some  desired 
good  by  a  little  politic  disobedience,  are  all  delusive.  .  .  . 

The  reasons  for  thus  specially  insisting  on  implicit 
obedience  will  become  apparent  as  the  reader  proceeds. 
Amongst  the  conclusions  inevitably  following  from  an 
admitted  principle,  he  will  most  likely  find  several  for 
which  he  is  hardly  prepared.  Some  of  these  will  seem 
strange  ;  others  impracticable  ;  and  it  may  be  one  or 
two  wholly  at  variance  with  his  ideas  of  duty.  Never- 
theless, should  he  find  them  logically  derived  from  a 
fundamental  truth,  he  will  have  no  alternative  but  to 
adopt  them  as  rules  of  conduct,  which  ought  to  be  fol- 
lowed without  exception.  If  there  be  any  weight  in  the 
considerations  above  set  forth,  then,  no  matter  how 
seemingly  inexpedient,  dangerous,  injurious  even,  may 
be  the  course  which  morality  points  out  as  "  abstractedly 
right,"  the  highest  wisdom  is  in  perfect  and  fearless 
submission. 

And  these  are  the  paragraphs  with  which  (pp.  517, 
518,)  "  Social  Statics  "  closes : 

Not  as  adventitious,  therefore,  will  the  wise  man  re- 
gard the  faith  that  is  in  him  —  not  as  something  which 
may  be  slighted,  and  made  subordinate  to  calculations 
of  policy ;  but  as  the  supreme  authority  to  which  all  his 
actions  should  bend.  The  highest  truth  conceivable 
by  him  he  will  fearlessly  utter;  and  will  endeavor  to 
get  embodied  in  fact  his  purest  idealisms  :  knowing  that, 
let  what  may  come  of  it,  he  is  thus  playing  his  appointed 
part  in  the  world  —  knowing  that,  if  he  can  get  done  the 
thing  he  aims  at  —  well:  if  not  —  well  also  ;  though  not 
so  well. 

And  thus,  in  teaching  a  uniform,  unquestioning  obedi- 
ence, does  an  entirely  abstract  philosophy  become  one 
with  all  true  religion.  Fidelity  to  conscience  —  this  is 
the  essential  precept  inculcated  by  both.     No  hesitation, 


THIS   ArOLOGY   EXAMINED.  109 

no  paltering  about  probable  results,  but  an  implicit 
submission  to  what  is  believed  to  be  the  law  laid  down 
for  us.  We  are  not  to  pay  lip  homage  to  principles 
which  our  couduct  wilfully  transgresses.  We  are  not 
to  follow  the  example  of  those  who,  taking  "  Domlne 
dirige  nos"  for  their  motto,  yet  disregard  the  directions 
given,  and  prefer  to  direct  themselves.  We  are  not  to 
be  guilty  of  that  practical  atheism,  which,  seeing  no 
guidance  for  human  affairs  but  its  own  limited  foresight, 
endeavors  itself  to  play  the  god,  and  decide  what  will 
be  good  for  mankind,  and  what  bad.  But,  on  the  con- 
trary, we  are  to  search  out  with  a  genuine  humility  the 
rules  ordained  for  us  —  are  to  do  unfalteringly,  without 
speculating  as  to  consequences,  whatsoever  these  require  ; 
and  we  are  to  do  this  in  the  belief  that  then,  when  there 
is  perfect  sincerity  —  when  each  man  is  true  to  himself 
—  when  every  one  strives  to  realize  what  he  thinks  the 
highest  rectitude  —  then  must  all  things  prosper. 

Could  there  be  any  sadder  commentary  upon  the 
Herbert  Spencer  who  in  1889  wrote  this  letter  to  the 
Times  f 

I  am  not  objecting  that  Mr.  Spencer  has  changed 
his  opinions.  Such  change  might  be  for  the  better  or 
might  be  for  the  worse,  but  it  would  at  least  be 
within  his  right.  What  I  point  out  is  that  in  this 
letter  to  the  Times,  as  in  his  previous  letter  to  the 
St.  James's  Gazette,  Mr.  Spencer  does  what  is  not 
within  his  right,  what  a  straight  man  could  not  do  — 
misstates  what  he  previously  did  say. 

And  while  Mr.  Spencer,  in  this  letter  to  the  Times, 
is  thus  untruthful  in  regard  to  what  he  had  taught  in 
"  Social  Statics,"  he  is  equally  untruthful  in  regard 
to  his  suppression  of  that  book.     His  words  are  — 

For  the  last  twelve  or  fifteen  years  I  have  refrained 
from  issuing  new  editions  of  that  work,  and  have  inter- 
dicted translations. 


110  REPtTDlATION. 

The  plain  meaning  of  this  is,  that  for  twelve  or 
fifteen  years  prior  to  1889  Mr.  Spencer  had  stopped 
the  publication  of  "Social  Statics."  There  is  no 
other  honest  construction.  And  this  is  the  way  in 
which  it  was  understood.  The  Times,  in  its  editorial 
comment  on  Mr.  Spencer's  letter,  taking  it  to  mean 
that  "for  the  last  fifteen  years  he  had  been  doing  all 
he  could  to  suppress  the  book ;  "  and  Mr.  Frederick 
Greenwood,  who  also  commented  on  the  letter,  taking 
it  to  mean  that  "  for  the  last  fifteen  years  he  had  not 
allowed  it  to  appear  in  any  language." 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  this  is  not  true.  "  Social 
Statics "  was  still  being  printed  by  Mr.  Spencer's 
authorized  publishers,  D.  Appleton  &  Co.  of  New 
York.  The  only  scintilla  of  truth  in  this  denial  is 
that,  as  he  has  since  (in  1892)  stated,  he  had  seven 
years  before  this  resolved  that  he  would  import  no 
more  copies  into  England.  As  for  the  "  interdiction 
of  translations,"  I  suppose  this  means  that  the  book 
bore  originally  the  usual  English  formula  "  Rights  of 
translation  reserved  " ;  for,  judging  from  its  going  out 
of  print  in  England,  and  its  never  having  been  pirated 
in  the  United  States,  it  is  not  likely  that  any  further 
interdiction  was  needed  to  prevent  its  translation. 

That  Mr.  Spencer  should  have  continued  the  pub- 
lication of  "  Social  Statics "  for  years  after  he  had 
told  the  readers  of  the  St.  James's  and  the  Time's  that 
he  had  suppressed  it,  I  can  only  account  for  on  the 
ground  that  he  did  not  care  to  deprive  himself  of 
what  revenue  he  was  drawing  fiom  its  sale,  and  had 
really  no  objection  to  the  circulation  of  his  attacks 
on  landlordism,  so  long  as  his  London  friends  did  not 
hear  of  it.     Certain  it  is,  that  he  could  have  with- 


THIS   APOLOGY   EXAMINED.  Ill 

drawn  it  at  any  time.  Appleton  &  Co.  are  not  book 
pirates,  but  honorable  gentlemen,  who  publish  Mr. 
Spencer's  works  under  arrangement  with  their  author, 
and  even  in  the  absence  of  a  copyright  law  Avould 
certainly  have  ceased  printing  "  Social  Statics,"  if  he 
had  requested.  To  any  one  who  knows  them  this 
needs  no  proof.  But  as  a  matter  of  fact,  in  1885, 
when  the  controversy  between  Mr.  Spencer  and  Mr. 
Frederic  Harrison  appeared  in  the  Nineteenth  Cen- 
tury^ the  Messrs.  Appleton,  thinking  there  would 
be  a  large  American  sale  for  it  in  book  form,  made 
plates  and  printed  an  edition.^  They  had  barely 
published  this  when  they  suppressed  it,  as  was  under- 
stood, on  a  cabled  request  from  Mr.  Spencer.  Not 
another  copy  went  out.  The  copies  printed  were 
destroyed  and  the  plates  melted,  although  a  rival 
firm  did  publish  the  controversy,  and  sell  a  consider- 
able number.  Or,  if  he  had  preferred  that,  D.  Apple- 
ton  &  Co.  would  at  any  time  have  printed  in  "  Social 
Statics  "  any  retraction  or  modiiication  of  its  expres- 
sions on  the  land  question  he  had  wished.  But, 
while  the  preface  prefixed  to  the  book  in  1864,  and 
the  note  to  Chapter  IV.  —  a  reply  to  Professor 
Sidgwick,  inserted  in  1875  —  and  the  additional  pref- 
ace added  in  1877,  did  set  forth  the  modifications 
of  Mr.  Spencer's  opinions  about  various  other  matters, 
they  contain  nothing  to  show  any  change  of  his  opin- 
ions on  the  land  question;  and  the  book  has  con- 
tinued to  be  published  up  to  1892  without  any  such 
modification. 

1  "  The  Nature  and  Reality  of  Religion.  A  Controversy  between 
Frederic  Harrison  and  Herbert  Spencer.  With  an  Introduction, 
Nolt'S,  and  an  Appendix  on  the  Religious  Value  of  the  Unknow- 
able, by  Count  D'Alviella."  New  York  :  IJ.  Appleton  &  Co.,  1,  3 
and  5  Bond  Street.     1885. 


112  REPUDIATION. 

It  is,  of  course,  not  for  me  to  object  that  Mr. 
Spencer  did  not  withdraw  "Social  Statics"  in  the 
only  place  where  it  was  being  published,  or  that  he 
did  not  insert  a  retraction  or  modification  of  its  utter- 
ances on  the  land  question  —  although  to  me  the  won- 
der is  that  when,  on  his  return  to  England  in  1882, 
he  seems  to  have  definitely  made  up  his  mind  to  take 
the  side  of  landlordism  if  pressed  to  it,  he  did  not 
melt  every  plate  and  buy  up  every  copy  he  could. 
I  am  only  comparing  Mr.  Spencer's  statements  in 
the  Times  with  the  facts,  because  of  the  evidence 
the  comparison  gives  of  tlie  character  of  the  man,  and 
because  of  the  light  it  throws  on  the  change  in  his 
opinions  on  the  land  question. 

For  this  letter  to  the  Times  not  only  shows  Mr. 
Spencer's  intense  desire  to  be  counted  on  the  side  of 
"  vested  interests  "  in  the  struggle  over  the  land  ques- 
tion that  was  beginning,  but  it  also  shows  how  he 
was  intending  to  join  formally  the  ranks  of  the  de- 
fenders of  private  property  in  land  without  the  hu- 
miliation of  an  open  recantation  of  what  he  had  said 
in  '•  Social  Statics."  By  aid  of  double-barrelled  ethics 
and  pliilosophic  legerdemain  Mr.  Spencer  evidently 
hopes  to  keep  some  reputation  for  consistency  and  yet 
uphold  private  property  in  land.  As  compared  with 
the  apology  in  the  St.  James's  G-azette,  the  new 
matter  in  this  apology  in  the  Times  consists  in  the 
conversion  of  what  he  said  in  "Social  Statics  "  (Sec- 
tion 7,  Chapter  IX.)  as  illustrating  that  "  after  all 
nobody  does  implicitly  believe  in  landlordism,"  into 
a  conformity  with  "  existing  legal  theory  and  prac- 
tice^'; in  the  assumption  that  the  compensation  of 
which  he  had  spoken  (Section  9)  meant  compensation. 


THIS   APOLOGY   EXAMINED.  113 

satisfactory  to  landlords ;  and  boldest  of  all  (for  this 
in  Chapter  X.,  Section  3,  he  had  expressly  denied),  in 
the  assumption  that  the  recognition  of  equal  rights 
to  land  means  the  administration  and  management  of 
land  by  public  officials. 

I  should  like  also  to  call  the  attention  of  those 
who  put  faith  in  Mr.  Spencer's  philosophic  acumen 
to  the  manner  in  which  in  this  letter  he  withdraws 
to  the  Scilly  Isles,  and  to  the  conditioning  of  the 
tenancy  of  land  upon  '*  professing  a  certain  creed  or 
adopting  prescribed  habits  of  life,"  his  condemnation 
of  private  property  in  land,  as  ethically  indefensible. 
They  have  their  choice  between  intellectual  incapacity 
and  intellectual  dishonesty.  What  logical  difference 
is  there  between  a  small  island  and  a  large  island  ? 
between  the  exaction  of  rent  in  personal  services  and 
the  exaction  of  rent  in  money  ?  Is  it  ethically  defen- 
sible to  deny  to  men  their  birthright,  to  permit  them 
to  live  on  the  earth  only  on  condition  that  they  shall 
give  up  for  the  privilege  all  that  their  labor  can  pro- 
duce save  the  barest  living,  to  reduce  them  to  straits 
that  compel  their  childi-en  to  grow  up  in  squalor  and 
vice  and  degradation  worse  than  any  heathenism,  and 
to  pass  out  of  life  in  thousands  before  they  are  fairly 
in  it ;  yet  ethically  indefensible  to  compel  them  to  pro- 
fess a  certain  creed  or  adopt  prescribed  habits  of  living  ? 
Ought  it  not  be  clear  even  to  a  philosopher's  appren- 
tice that  if  English  landlords  to-day  do  not  prescribe 
the  creed  or  habits  of  their  tenants,  it  is  only  because 
they  do  not  care  to,  but  prefer  generally  to  exercise 
their  power  in  taking  money  rent?  If  the  Duke  of 
Westminster  wanted  to  have  a  thousand  retainers, 
clad  in  his  livery,  follow  him  to  St.  James's  ;  if  the 


114  REPUDIATION. 

Duke  of  Norfolk  cared  to  i3ermit  no  one  but  Catho- 
lics to  live  on  his  estates ;  if  the  Duke  of  Argyll  chose 
to  have  a  buffoon  at  his  elbow  in  cap  and  bells,  they 
could  have  any  of  these  things  as  readily,  in  fact 
even  more  readily,  than  could  any  Earl  or  Duke 
of  the  olden  time.  And  so  indeed  could  any  of  our 
great  American  land-owners.  Did  Mr.  Spencer  never 
see  in  London  newspapers  offers  of  employment, 
conditioned  on  the  profession  of  a  certain  creed  ?  Did 
he  never,  in  passing  to  and  from  the  Athenaeum  Club, 
see  coachmen  and  footmen  dressed  in  fantastic  liver- 
ies and  "sandwich  men"  clad  ridiculously  and  shame- 
fully ?  Does  he  not  know  that  in  the  British  Isles 
in  his  own  time  men  are  driven  off  the  land  to  give 
place  to  wild  beasts  or  cattle  ?  And  does  he  not 
know  that  the  power  of  forbidding  the  use  of  his  land 
gives  to  every  land-owner  the  same  powers  of  pre- 
scribing the  conditions  under  which  he  will  permit  its 
use  as  any  owner  of  the  Scilly  Isles  possibly  could 
have? 

The  view  we  thus  get  of  Mr.  Spencer's  mental 
progress  and  processes  is  interesting  both  philosoph- 
ically and  psychologically.  As,  however,  we  shall  find 
the  lines  of  escape  thus  indicated  amj)lified  in 
"  Justice,"  there  is  no  need  of  examining  them  now. 
But  what  he  here  says  on  the  matter  of  compensation 
has  a  special  interest  as  throwing  light  on  what  he 
really  meant  in  that  incongruous  passage  in  Section 
9,  Chapter  IX.,  of  "  Social  Statics,"  of  which  I  have 
spoken.  In  this  letter  to  the  Times  the  only  passage 
from  "  Social  Statics  "  that  is  quoted,  or  indeed  more 
than  vaguely  alluded  to,  is  this.  That  Mr.  Spencer 
intends  the  Times  and  its  readers  to  understand  this 


THIS   APOLOGY   EXAMINED.  115 

as  a  recognition  in  "  Social  Statics  "  of  tlic  justice  of 
the  claim  of  land-owners  to  compensation  for  their 
land  is  clear,  for  he  carefully  leaves  out  all  mention 
of  the  closely-linked  sentences  that  immediately  fol- 
low the  passage  he  quotes : 

But  with  this  perplexity  and  our  extrication  from  it 
abstract  morality  has  no  concern.  Men  having  got  them- 
selves into  this  dilemma  by  disobedience  to  law,  must  get 
out  of  it  as  well  as  they  can,  and  with  as  little  injury  to 
the  landed  class  as  may  be. 

Meanwhile  we  shall  do  well  to  recollect  that  there  are 
others  beside  the  lauded  class  to  be  considered.  In  our 
tender  regard  for  the  vested  interests  of  the  few,  let  us 
not  forget  that  the  rights  of  the  many  are  in  abeyance, 
and  must  remain  so  as  long  as  the  earth  is  monopolized 
by  individuals.  Let  us  remember,  too,  that  the  injustice 
thus  inflicted  on  the  masses  of  mankind  is  an  injustice 
of  the  gravest  nature  .  .  .  inferior  only  in  wickedness  to 
the  crime  of  taking  away  their  lives  or  personal  liberties. 

But  while  it  is  clear  that  Mr.  Spencer  wishes  the 
Times  and  its  readers  to  understand  that  he  not  only 
is,  but  always  was,  as  good  a  compensationist  as  land- 
lords could  desire,  he  falls  later  on  into  an  expression 
that  again  shows,  as  does  the  passage  in  "Political 
Institution,"  that  the  explanation  I  have  put  upon 
that  seemingly  incongruous  passage  in  "Social  Stat- 
ics "  is  the  one  really  intended.  In  the  last  part  of 
tlie  letter  he  speaks  of  "  compensation  for  the  artificial 
value  given  hy  cultivation  amounting  to  the  greater  part 
of  its  value."  Not  compensation  for  land^  but  com- 
pensation only  for  improvements.  But  this  would 
never  satisfy  land-owners,  and  so,  without  respect  for 
the  axiom  that  the  whole  is  greater  than  its  part,  he 
proceeds  to  assert  that  compensation  for  this  part 


116  REPUDIATION. 

will  equal,  and  indeed  exceed,  the  value  of  all  they 
now  get. 

Thus  we  see  both  what  the  question  of  compensa- 
tion had  really  been  in  Mr.  Spencer's  own  mind,  and 
how  he  now  proposes  to  settle  it,  so  that  he  may 
henceforward  take  the  side  of  existinar  landlordism. 


CHAPTER   V. 

SECOND   LETTER    TO   THE   TIMES. 

In  his  letter  to  the  Times  Mr.  Spencer  had  surely 
abased  himself  enough  to  have  been  let  alone  by 
those  whose  favor  he  had  so  dearly  sought.  But  even 
those  who  profit  by  apostasy  often  like  to  show  their 
contempt  for  the  apostate.  Though  the  Times  itself 
accepted  his  apology,  it  added  some  contemptuous 
reproof,  and  gave  place  to  letters  from  Mr.  Green- 
wood, Professor  Huxley  and  Sir  Louis  Mallet  that 
must  have  been  extremely  galling  to  a  renowned 
philosopher. 

Here  is  the  pertinent  part  of  what  the  Times 
said: 

So,  without  denying  that  he  did  once  say  something 
of  the  sort,  he  explains  thPvt  it  was  forty  years  ago,  that 
for  the  last  fifteen  years  he  has  been  doing  all  he  can  to 
suppress  the  book  in  which  he  said  it,  and  that  he  never 
meant  his  words  to  have  any  bearing  upon  practical  ques- 
tions. He  was  in  fact  engaged  in  constructing  a  system 
of  "  absolute  political  ethics,  or  that  which  ought  to  be," 
and  he  feels  distinctly  aggrieved  by  the  transfer  of  his 
opinions  from  that  transcendental  sphere  to  the  very 
different  one  in  which  Mr.  Laidler  and  his  friends  are 
accustomed  to  dwell.  .  .  .  What  Mr.  Spencer  said  in  his 
youth  and  inexperience  he  has  unsaid  in  his  maturer 
years  and  with  more  deliberate  judgment.  .  .  . 

Were  we  asked  to  point  a  moral  for  philosophers,  we 
should  bid  them  beware  of  meddling  with  the  absolute. 
Forty  years  ago  Mr.  Spencer  set  forth  in  search  of  "  ab- 


118  REPUDIATION. 

solute  political  ethics,"  and  constructed  his  system  to 
his  own  satisfaction.  But  it  turns  out  to  have  been  the 
most  relative  of  things  after  all,  since  for  the  last  fifteen 
years  it  has  ceased  to  be  absolute  even  to  the  mind  that 
couceived  it.  .  .  .  Mr.  Spencer  settled  that  which  ought  to 
be,  as  regards  land  ownership,  but  a  quarter  of  a  century 
later  we  find  him  endeavoring,  much  to  the  credit  of  his 
modesty  and  candor,  to  suppress  his  own  version  of  the 
absolute.  He  does  not  seem,  however,  to  have  abandoned 
the  original  quest,  for  he  gives  us  his  revised  conclusions 
as  to  the  absolute  ethics  of  laud-tenure,  which  appear  to 
us  to  contain  some  of  the  original  identical  flaws  which 
were  to  be  found  in  the  older  version. 

The  communication  from  Mr.  Frederick  Greenwood, 
an  able  high-Tory  journalist,  was  published  by  the 
Times  on  the  9th,  under  the  heading  "  A  Caution  to 
Social  Philosophers."  Characterizing  Mr.  Spencer's 
letter  to  the  Times  as  "  a  heavy  lesson  to  political 
philosophers,"  Mr.  Greenwood  points  out  that  "no 
matter  how  sorry  Mr.  Spencer  may  be  for  having 
misled  so  many  poor  men  who  habitually  hang  on  the 
authority  of  great  men  like  himself,"  yet  the  very- 
quotation  he  makes  from  his  "  Political  Institutions  " 
contains  the  same  seeds  of  error  in  its  admission  that 
"  ownership  established  by  force  does  not  stand  on 
the  same  footing  as  ownership  established  by  con- 
tract," and  in  its  admission  that  "  the  assimilation  of 
the  two  owners-hips  may  eventually  be  denied." 

Sir  Louis  Mallet's  letter,  published  on  November 
12th,  was  to  similar  effect.  He  pointed  out  that  Mr. 
Spencer  still  admitted  an  analogy  between  private 
property  in  land  and  slavery,  which,  of  course,  to  Sir 
Louis  seemed  dangerous  and  wicked. 

Professor  Huxley  came  at  the  philosopher  in  a 
bull-headed  way  that  must  have  seemed  very  unkind. 


SECOND   LETTEIl   TO   THE   TIMES.  119 

Speaking  in  the  name  of  those  "  to  whom  absolute 
political  ethics  and  a  priori  politics  are  alike  stum- 
bling-blocks," and  expressing  the  certainty  that  hia 
friend,  Mr.  Spencer,  would  be  the  last  person  willingly 
to  abet  the  tendency  to  sanction  popular  acts  of 
injustice  by  antiquarian  or  speculative  arguments, 
he  asked  him  for  a  categorical  answer  to  the  question 
whether  according  to  "  absolute  political  ethics,"  A. 
B.,  who  has  bought  a  piece  of  land  in  England,  as  he 
might  buy  a  cabbage,  has  a  moral  as  well  as  a  legal 
riglit  to  his  land  or  not? 

And  he  follows  with  these  pertinent  questions : 

If  he  does  not,  how  does  "absolute  political  ethics" 
deduce  his  right  to  compensation  ? 

If  he  does,  how  does  "absolute  political  ethics" 
deduce  the  state's  right  to  disturb  him  ? 

By  this  time  Mr.  Spencer  must  have  wished  he 
had  not  written  to  the  Times,  though  it  is  a  striking 
evidence  of  the  little  knowledge  of  "  Social  Statics  " 
in  England  (a  fact  on  which  Mr.  Spencer  had  evi- 
dently calculated),  that  in  none  of  these  letters,  or 
in  those  that  followed,  do  any  of  the  "  hecklers," 
with  the  one  exception  of  Mr.  Laidler,  seem  to  have 
any  knowledge  of  what  Mr.  Spencer  had  really  said 
in  that  book  —  a  knowledge  that  would  have  roused 
their  ire  to  a  far  higher  pitch,  and  enabled  them  to 
ask  still  harder  questions. 

The  reader  may  wonder  why  in  an  attempt  to  deny 
his  utterances  in  "  Social  Statics,"  Mr.  Spencer  should 
have  printed  the  passage  from  "Political  Institutions," 
which  is  in  reality  a  re-affirmation  of  them.  The  only 
explanation  I  can  offer  is  that  he  felt  that  he  must 


120  REPUDIATION. 

print  something,  and  had  ahsolutely  nothing  else  to 
print.  For  there  is  no  word  in  all  his  works  up  to 
this  time  ("Justice"  being  yet  to  come)  that  gives 
tlie  slightest  evidence  of  any  modification  of  the  views 
set  forth  in  "  Social  Statics."  And  since  he  had  six 
years  before  successfully  referred  to  this  j^assage,  as 
though  it  indicated  a  modification  of  his  views,  he 
probably  felt  safe  in  so  using  it  a  second  time. 
Thinking  that  it  would  suffice  to  settle  Mr.  Laidler, 
he  evidently  did  not  calculate  on  its  provoking  a 
"  fire  in  the  rear,"  from  his  ovv^n  friends,  the  adhe- 
rents of  landlordism,  when  he  was  giving  up  every- 
thing real,  and  only  striving  to  save  a  semblance  of 
consistency. 

Mr.  Spencer  conveniently  ignored  the  letters  of 
Mr.  Greenwood  and  Sir  Louis  Mallet,  but  he  did 
make  a  pretence  of  answering  Professor  Huxley,  in  a 
letter  published  in  the  Times,  November  15th. 

Here  is  the  letter,  which,  although  the  first  para- 
graph only  is  pertinent  to  the  task  I  have  in  mind,  I 
give  in  full,  in  order  to  guard  against  Mr.  Spencer's 
controversial  habit  of  saying  that  his  utterances  have 
been  garbled  : 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Times. 

Sir  :  As  Professor  Huxley  admits  that  his  friend  A.  B.'s 
title  to  his  plot  of  land  is  qualified  by  the  right  of  the 
state  to  dispossess  him  if  it  sees  well  —  as,  by  implica- 
tion, he  admits  that  all  land-owners  hold  their  land  sub- 
ject to  the  supreme  ownership  of  the  state,  that  is,  tlie 
community  —  as  he  contends  that  any  force  or  fraud  by 
which  land  was  taken  in  early  days  does  not  affect  the 
titles  of  existing  owners,  and  a  fortiori  does  not  affect 
the  superior  title  of  the  community  —  and  as,  conse- 
quently, he  admits  that  the  community,  as  supreme 
owner  with  a  still  valid  title,  may  resume  possession  if 


SECOND  LETTER  TO  THE  TIMEO.       121 

it  thinks  well,  he  seems  to  me  to  leave  the  question 
standing  very  much  where  it  stood ;  and  since  he,  as  I 
suppose,  agrees  with  me  that  any  such  resumption, 
should  a  misjudgment  lead  to  it,  ought  to  be  accompa- 
nied by  due  compensation  for  all  artificial  value  given  to 
land,  I  do  not  see  in  what  respect  we  disagree  on  the 
land  question.  I  pass,  therefore,  to  his  comments  on 
absolute  political  ethics. 

"  Your  treatment  is  quite  at  variance  M'ith  physiological  prin- 
ciples" woukl  probably  be  the  criticism  passed  by  a  modern  practi- 
tioner on  the  doings  of  a  Sangrado,  if  we  suppose  one  to  have 
survived.  "  Oh,  bother  your  physiological  principles  "  might  be  the 
reply.  "  I  have  got  to  cure  this  disease,  and  my  experience  tells 
me  that  bleeding  and  frequent  draughts  of  hot  water  are  needed." 
"  Well,"  would  be  the  rejoinder,  "  if  you  do  not  kill  your  patient, 
you  will  at  any  rate  greatly  retard  his  recovery,  as  you  would  prob- 
ably be  aware  had  you  read  Professor  Huxley's  '  Lessons  on  Ele- 
mentary Physiology,'  and  the  more  elaborate  books  on  the  subject 
which  medical  students  have  to  master." 

This  imaginary  conversation  will  sufficiently  suggest 
that,  before  there  can  be  rational  treatment  of  a  disor- 
dered state  of  the  bodily  functions,  there  must  be  a  con- 
ception of  what  constitutes  their  ordered  state  :  know- 
ing what  is  abnormal  implies  knowing  what  is  normal. 
That  Professor  Huxley  recognizes  this  truth  is,  I  suppose, 
proved  by  the  inclusion  of  physiology  in  that  course  of 
medical  education  which  he  advocates.  If  he  says  that 
abandonment  of  the  Sangrado  treatment  was  due,  not  to 
the  teachings  of  physiology,  but  to  knowledge  empirically 
gained,  then  I  reply  that  if  he  expands  this  statement 
so  as  to  cover  all  improvements  in  medical  treatment  he 
suicidally  rejects  the  teaching  of  physiological  princi- 
ples as  useless. 

Without  insisting  upon  that  analogy  between  a  society 
and  an  organism  which  results  from  the  interdependence 
of  parts  performing  different  functions  —  though  I  be- 
lieve he  recognizes  this  —  I  think  he  will  admit  that 
conception  of  a  social  state  as  disordered  implies  con- 
ception of  an  ordered  social  state.  We  may  fairly 
assume  that,  in  these  modern  days  at  least,  all  legisla- 
tion aims  at  a  better;  and  the  conception  of  a  better 
is  not  possible  without  conception  of  a  best.  If  there  is 
rejoicing  because  certain  diseases  have  been  diminished 


122  REPUDIATION. 

by  precautions  enforced,  the  implied  ideal  is  a  state  in 
which  these  diseases  have  been  extinguished.  If  par- 
ticular measures  are  applauded  because  they  have  de- 
creased criminality,  the  implication  is  that  the  absence 
of  all  crime  is  a  desideratum.  Hence,  liowever  much  a 
politician  may  pooh-pooh  social  ideals,  he  cannot  take 
steps  toward  bettering  the  social  state  without  tacitly 
entertaining  them.  And  though  he  may  regard  absolute 
political  ethics  as  an  airy  vision,  lie  makes  bit  by  bit 
reference  to  it  in  everything  he  does.  I  simply  differ 
from  him  in  contending  for  a  consistent  and  avowed 
reference,  instead  of  an  inconsistent  and  unacknowl- 
edged reference. 

Even  without  any  such  strain  on  the  imagination  as 
may  be  required  to  conceive  a  community  consisting 
entirely  of  honest  and  honorable  men  —  even  without 
asking  whether  there  is  not  a  set  of  definite  limits  to 
individual  actions  wliich  such  men  would  severally 
insist  upon  and  respect  —  even  without  asserting  that 
these  limits  must,  in  the  nature  of  things,  result  when 
men  have  severally  to  carry  on  their  lives  in  proximity 
with  one  another,  I  should  have  thought  it  sufficiently 
clear  that  our  system  of  justice,  by  interdicting  murder, 
assault,  theft,  libel,  etc.,  recognizes  the  existence  of  such 
limits  and  the  necessity  for  maintaining  them ;  and  I 
should  have  thought  it  manifest  enough  that  there  must 
exist  an  elaborate  system  of  limits  or  restraints  on 
conduct,  by  conformity  to  which  citizens  may  co-operate 
without  dissension.  Such  a  system,  deduced  as  it  may 
be  from  the  primary  conditions  to  be  fulfilled,  is  what 
I  mean  by  absolute  political  ethics.  The  complaint  of 
Professor  Huxley  that  absolute  political  ethics  does  not 
show  us  what  to  do  in  each  concrete  case  seems  to  be 
much  like  the  complaint  of  a  medical  practitioner  who 
should  speak  slightingly  of  physiological  generalizations, 
because  they  did  not  tell  him  the  right  dressing  for  a 
wound  or  how  best  to  deal  with  varicose  veins.  I  can- 
not here  explain  further,  but  any  one  who  does  not 
understand  me  may  find  the  matter  discussed  at  length 
in  a  chapter  on  "  Absolute  and  llelative  Ethics "  con- 
tained in  the  "  Data  of  Ethics." 

It  appears  to  me  somewhat  anomalous  that  Professor 


SECOND   LETTER   TO   THE   TIMES.  123 

Huxley,  who  is  not  simply  a  biologist  but  is  familiar 
with  science  at  large,  and  who  must  recognize  the  reign 
of  law  on  every  hand,  should  tacitly  assume  that  there 
exists  one  group  of  lawless  phenomena  —  social  phenom- 
ena. For  if  they  are  not  lawless  —  if  there  are  any 
natural  laws  traceable  throughout  them,  then  our  aim 
should  be  to  ascertain  these  and  conform  to  them,  well 
knowing  that  non-conformity  will  inevitably  bring  pen- 
alties. Not  taking  this  view,  however,  it  would  seem  as 
though  Professor  Huxley  agrees  with  the  mass  of  "  prac- 
tical "  politicians,  who  think  tliat  every  legislative  meas- 
ure is  to  be  decided  by  estimation  of  probabilities  un- 
guided  by  a  j^j/'iort  conclusions.  Well,  had  they  habitu- 
ally succeeded,  one  might  not  wonder  that  they  should 
habitually  ridicule  abstract  principles  ;  but  the  astound- 
ing accumulation  of  failures  might  have  been  expected 
to  cause  less  confidence  in  empirical  methods.  Of  the 
18,110  public  Acts  passed  between  20  Henry  III.  and  the 
end  of  1872,  Mr.  Janson,  Vice-President  of  the  Law 
Society,  estimates  that  four-fifths  have  been  wholly  or 
partially  repealed,  and  that  in  the  years  1870-72  there 
were  repealed  3,532  Acts,  of  which  2,759  were  totally 
repealed.  Further,  I  myself  found,  on  examining  the 
books  for  1881-83,  that  in  those  years  there  had  been 
repealed  650  Acts  belonging  to  the  present  reign,  besides 
many  of  preceding  reigns.  Remembering  that  Acts 
which  are  repealed  have  been  doing  mischief,  which 
means  loss,  trouble,  pain  to  great  numbers  —  remember- 
ing, thus,  the  enormous  amount  of  suffering  which  this 
helter-skelter  legislation  has  inflicted  for  generations 
and  for  centuries,  I  think  it  would  be  not  amiss  to  ask 
whether  better  guidance  may  not  be  had,  even  though  it 
should  come  from  absolute  political  ethics. 

I  regret  that  neither  space  nor  health  will  permit  me 
to  discuss  any  of  the  questions  raised  by  Sir  Louis 
Mallet.  And  here,  indeed,  I  find  myself  compelled  to 
desist  altogether.  In  so  far  as  I  am  concerned,  the 
controversy  must  end  with  this  letter. 

I  am,  etc., 

Herbert  Spencer. 

ATHENiKOM   Club,  Nov.  13. 


124  KEPUDIATION. 

Really,  this  "  Answer  to  Professor  Huxley  "  is  no 
answer  at  all.  What  Mr.  Spencer  virtually  says  is : 
"  I  admit  all  that  the  land-owners  may  want  me  to 
admit.     Let  us  change  the  subject." 

Yet  even  in  thus  changing  the  subject,  he  is  obliged 
to  give  up  the  distinction  he  had  made  between  abso- 
lute political  ethics  and  relative  political  ethics,  for  his 
long-drawn  explanation  to  Professor  Huxley  means, 
if  it  means  anything  at  all,  that  absolute  political 
ethics  do  have  a  bearing  on  practical  political  conduct. 


CHAPTER   VI. 

MORE   LETTERS. 

"With  this  Mr.  Spencer  endeavored  to  withdraw, 
and  no  wonder.  But  letters  from  Mr.  Greenwood, 
Professor  Huxley,  and  a  number  of  new  participants, 
including  Auberon  Herbert  for  the  defence,  continued 
to  appear  in  the  Titnes  for  some  time  longer,  and 
Messrs.  Greenwood  and  Huxley  succeeded  in  drag- 
ging from  him  another  brief  confession. 

Professor  Huxley  made  him  give  up  his  illustra- 
tion from  physiological  principles,  and  Mr.  Green- 
wood, pressing  him  as  to  whether,  as  averred  by  Mr. 
Laidler,  he  had  ever  said  that  to  right  one  wrong 
it  takes  another,  first  made  him  declare  that  he  did 
not  remember  to  have  said  it,  and  then,  pressing  him 
still  farther,  made  him  declare  he  had  not  said  it 
and  to  repudiate  it  if  he  had. 

Although  this  is  a  mere  side-issue,  perhaps  it  may 
be  worth  while,  even  at  this  late  date,  to  vindicate 
Mr.  Laidler  and  refresh  Mr.  Spencer's  memory.  In 
"  Social  Statics,"  Chapter  XXI.,  "  The  Duty  of  the 
State,"  Section  8,  may  be  found  the  doctrine  which 
Mr.  Laidler  referred  to,  when,  in  citing  Mr.  Spencer 
against  Mr.  Morley's  objection  to  land  nationaliza- 
tion, he  said,  as  reported  by  the  Times  — 

Mr.  Spencer  has  said  that  the  land  had  been  taken  by 
force  and  fraud.  That  gentleman  had  also  said  that  to 
right  one  wrong  it  takes  another. 


126  EEPUDIATION. 

This  in  effect,  if  not  in  exact  words,  Mr.  Spencer 
certainly  does  say  in  Chapter  XXI.,  Section  8,  in  com- 
Ijatinof  the  doctrine  of  non-resistance.  He  declares  all 
coercion  immoral  in  itself,  but  (using  the  same  terms 
in  the  same  sense  as  Mr.  Laidler)  justifies  govern- 
ment when  "it  uses  wrong  to  put  down  wrong." 
He  adds : 

The  principle  of  non-resistanoe  is  not  etliically  true, 
hut  only  that  of  non-aggression  ....  We  may  not  care- 
lessly abandon  our  rights.  We  may  not  give  away  our 
birthright  for  the  sake  of  peace.  .  .  ,  We  may  not  be 
passive  under  aggression.  In  due  maintenance  of  our 
claim  is  involved  the  practicability  of  all  our  duties.  .  .  . 
If  we  allow  ourselves  to  he  deprived  of  that  without 
which  we  cannot  fulfil  the  Divine  will,  we  virtually 
negative  that  will. 

I  thus  take  the  trouble  to  refresh  Mr.  Spencer's 
memory  and  vindicate  Mr.  Laidler,  for,  although  the 
latter  gentleman  was  allowed  one  letter  in  the  Times, 
it  was  afterwards  that  the  question  was  raised  by 
Mr.  Greenwood,  and  I  do  not  sujjpose  that  Mr. 
Laidler  got  another  chance,  the  Times  speaking  of 
him  contemptuously,  as  a  Mr.  Laidler,  and  printing 
his  letter  in  smaller  type,  although  it  was  he  who 
first  brought  out  Mr.  Spencer,  and  provoked  the 
whole  discussion. 

Mr.  Laidler's  letter,  of  which  neither  party  to  the 
controversy  seemed  to  care  to  take  notice,  was  pub- 
lished by  the  Times  on  the  same  day  as  Mr.  Spencer's 
second  letter.     He  said  — 

To  the  Editor  of  the  Times. 

Sir  :  As  one  of  the  deputation  of  members  of  the 
Newcastle  Labor  Electoral  Organization  who  recently 
waited  upon  Mr.  John  Morley,  M.  P.,  to  ascertain  his 


MORE   LETTERS.  127 

opinion  on  certain  political  and  social  topics,  I  was 
iiitrnsted  by  ni}-  fellow-uieiiibers  of  the  deputation  with 
tlie  question  of  the  nationalization  of  the  land,  and  this 
subject  1  discussed  Avith  Mr.  Morley.  In  doing  so,  I 
sought  to  back  up  my  position  by  quoting  the  ninth 
chapter  of  "  Social  Statics,"  by  Mr,  Herbert  Spencer, 
and  I  certainly  thought  I  had  a  good  case  when  I  found 
on  ray  side  the  most  distinguished  authority  of  our  time. 
To  my  great  surprise,  I  now  find  that  in  the  letters 
which  he  has  addressed  to  you,  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
appears  to  be  very  anxious  to  repudiate  the  doctrines 
which  he  preached  so  eloquently  in  1850.  Now,  although 
it  is  a  common  thing  for  the  politician  of  to-day  to 
repudiate  principles  and  deductions  which  he  formerly 
Avarmly  espoused  and  to  adopt  others  which  he  once 
energetically  condemned,  one  does  not  expect  the  same 
vacillation  on  the  part  of  a  distinguished  philosopher 
like  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer.  I  find  it  difficult  to  under- 
stand his  position,  which  seems  to  be  this  —  that  while 
adhering  to  his  general  principles  he  abandons  certain 
deductions  therefroni.  Now,  to  my  mind,  the  ninth 
chapter  of  "  Social  Statics,"  which  deals  with  "  The 
Right  to  the  Use  of  the  Earth,"  seems  as  true,  as  logical, 
and  as  unanswerable  an  argument  in  favor  of  the  nation- 
alization of  the  land  as  it  doubtless  appeared  to  Mr. 
Herbert  Spencer  on  the  day  it  Avas  written.  Let  us 
trace  the  course  of  his  argument  through  the  ten  sec- 
tions of  which  the  chapter  is  composed. 

Giving  a  short  abstract  of  these  ten  sections  of 
Chapter  IX.  Mr.  Laidler  continued  — 

In  the  foregoing  digest,  beyond  one  or  two  connect- 
ing words,  the  language  is  that  of  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
himself.  Does  it  not  constitute  an  unanswerable  argu- 
ment in  favor  of  the  nationalization  of  the  land  ?  If  the 
author  would  permit  it  to  be  reprinted,  what  an  admira- 
ble tract  the  ninth  chapter  of  "  Social  Statics  "  would  be 
for  the  propagation  of  socialistic  ^  principles  !     But  he 

1  Mr.  Laidler  uses  the  term  socialistic  in  the  vague  way  in 
which  it  is  so  commonly  used  in  England,  and  doubtless  means 
land  nationalization  principles. 


128  REPUDIATION. 

now  seems  to  repudiate  the  offspring  of  his  own  genius  ! 
We  have,  however,  a  right  to  ask  that,  instead  of  a 
vague  repudiation  in  general  terms,  Mr.  Herbert  Spen- 
cer should  tell  us  specitically  what  deductions  he  has 
abandoned  and  why  he  has  abandoned  them.  We  might 
then  endeavor  to  answer  his  answers  to  his  own  propo- 
sitions. 

Yours, 

John  Laidlek,  Bricklayer. 

How  far  Mr.  Spencer  has  tried  to  answer  his  own 
propositions,  we  shall  see  in  "  Justice." 


FA.RT   III. 

RECANTATION. 


I.  THE  FATE  OF  "SOCIAL  STATICS." 

II.  THE    PLACE    OF   "JUSTICE"    IN    THE    SYNTHETIC    PHI- 
LOSOPHY. 

III.  THE  SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY. 

IV.  THE  IDEA  OF  JUSTICE  IN  THE  SYNTHETIC  PHILOSOPHY. 
V.  MR.  SPENCER'S   TASK. 

VI.  "  THE  RIGHTS   TO  THE  USES  OF  NATURAL  MEDIA." 

VII.  "JUSTICE"  ON  THE  RIGHT  TO  LIGHT  AND  AIR. 

VIII.  "JUSTICE"  ON  THE  RIGHT  TO  LAND. 

IX.  "JUSTICE"  — THE  RIGHT  OF  PROPERTY. 

X.  THE  RIGHT  OF  PROPERTY  AND  THE  RIGHT  OF  TAXATION. 

XI.  COMPENSATION. 

XIL  "  JUSTICE  "  — THE  LAND  QUESTION. 

XIII.  PRINCIPAL  BROWN. 


Equity  therefore  does  not  permit  property  in  land.  .  .  .  Not  only  have 
present  laud-tenures  an  indefensible  origin,  but  it  is  impossible  to  discover 
any  mode  in  which  land  can  become  private  property.  .  .  .  Ethical  truth  is 
as  exact  and  as  peremptory  as  physical  truth ;  and  thut  in  this  matter  of  land- 
tenure  the  verdict  of  morality  must  be  distinctly  aye  or  nay.  Either  men 
haee  a  right  to  make  the  soil  private  property,  or  they  have  not.  There  is  no 
medium.  We  must  choose  one  of  the  two  positions.  There  can  be  no  half- 
and-half  opinion.  In  the  nature  of  things  the  fact  must  be  either  one  way 
or  the  other.  —  Herbert  Spencer,  1850. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE  FATE  OF   "SOCIAL   STATICS." 

We  now  come  to  the  purpose  for  which  the  pre- 
ceding lengthy  examination  has  been  made :  the 
consideration  of  Mr.  Spencer's  present  opinions  on 
the  land  question,  as  set  forth  with  all  the  weight 
of  the  "Synthetic  Philosophy"  in  its  author's  most 
recent  volume,  "Justice,"  which  bears  date  of  June, 
1891,  and  was  published  somewhat  later  in  that  year. 

But  it  will  be  best  to  break  the  chronological 
order,  and  record  here  the  fate  of  "  Social  Statics." 
Even  after  Mr.  Spencer  had  made  the  Times  and 
Mr.  Greenwood  believe  that  he  had  suppressed  it 
years  before,  that  book  still  continued  to  be  publislied 
by  Mr.  Spencer's  authorized  publishers,  D.  Appleton 
&  Co.,  and  their  edition  of  "  Justice,"  published  in 
October,  1891,  contains  an  advertisement  of  it  in  its 
original  form.  But  now,  at  last,  it  has  been  done 
for.  It  has  not  been  killed  outright ;  that  would  be 
mercy  compared  with  its  present  fate.  It  has  —  and 
I  cannot  but  feel  that  "  Progress  and  Poverty,"  the 
Edinburgh  reviewer,  and  Mr.  John  Laidler  of  New- 
castle, have  been  innocent  causes  of  its  fate  —  it  has 
been  disembowelled,  stuffed,  mummified,  and  then  set 
up  in  the  gardens  of  the  Spencerian  Philosophy, 
where  it  may  be  viewed  with  entire  complacency  by 
Sir  John  and  his  Grace. 


132  RECANTATION. 

Soberly,  the  original  volume  has  with  this  year  been 
withdrawn  from  publication,  to  give  place  to  a  new 
"  Social  StaticSf"  dated  January,  1892,  and  published 
in  February.  This  volume,  which  is,  of  course,  now 
to  pass  in  the  publisher's  lists  as  "  Social  Statics,"  has 
for  full  title,  "Social  Statics,  abridged  and  revised, 
together  with  'The  Man  versus  the  State.'  "  It  con- 
sists of  disjointed  fragments  of  the  old  "  Social 
Statics,"  which,  in  order  to  make  some  approach  to 
the  bulk  of  the  original,  is  padded  out  with  the 
magazine  articles  before  referred  to.  In  the  preface 
Mr.  Spencer  says : 

My  first  intention  was  to  call  this  volume,  or,  rather, 
part  of  a  volume,  "Fragments  from  Social  Statics,"  and 
afterwards,  "Selections  from  Social  Statics."  Both  of 
these  titles,  however,  seemed  to  indicate  a  much  less 
coherent  assemblage  of  parts  than  it  contains.  On  the 
other  hand,  to  call  it  an  abridgment  is  somewhat  mis- 
leading, since  the  word  fails  to  imply  that  large  and 
constructively  important  parts  are  omitted.  No  title, 
however,  appears  appropriate,  and  I  have  at  length  de- 
cided that  Social  Statics,  abridged  and  revised,  is  the 
least  inappropriate. 

If  appropriateness  was  what  Mr.  Spencer  sought, 
it  does  seem  as  if  a  title  much  less  inappropriate 
might  have  been  found.  For  the  only  discernible 
principle  of  revision  is  the  chopping-out  of  all  that 
might  imply  a  God  or  offend  vested  interests,  in  the 
same  fashion  that  Russian  censors  revise  distasteful 
works,  the  result  being  a  Hamlet  from  which  not 
only  Hamlet  himself,  but  the  Ghost,  the  Queen 
Mother,  and  Ophelia,  have  gone.  The  "  First  Prin- 
ciple "  is  left,  but  everything  large  or  small  relating 
to  land  is  omitted.     Tiie  only  allusion  to  land  is  in 


•       THE   FATE   OF  "SOCIAL   STATICS."  133 

the  cavilling  at  Locke,  which  is  retained,  and  that 
what  was  originally  Section  3,  Chapter  X.,  now  con- 
verted into  a  chapter,  headed  "  Socialism,"  is  left  by 
careless  editing  to  begin,  as  in  the  original : 

The  doctrine  that  all  men  have  equal  rights  to  the  use 
of  the  earth  seems  at  first  sight  to  countenance  a  species 
of  social  organization  at  variance  with  that  from  which 
the  right  of  property  has  just  been  deduced.* 

The  foot-note  indicated  by  this  asterisk  is: 

*  Kefcrring  to  an  omitted  part  of  the  last  cliaptcr,  the  argument  of  which, 
with  modilicaiious,  will  now  be  found  in  Part  IV.  of  the  Principles  of 
Ethics. 

Thus  revised,  "  Social  Statics "  no  further  con- 
cerns us.  All  that  Mr.  Spencer  originally  said  about 
the  relation  between  men  and  the  earth  having  now 
been  definitely  withdrawn,  we  are  referred  for  his 
present  opinions  to  the  book  we  are  about  to 
consider. 

But  the  advertising  of  the  revised  "  Social  Statics  " 
is  worth  noting,  as  by  some  blunder  it  lays  before 
the  American  reader  what  was  originally  intended 
for  Eno-lish  circulation  onlv,  and  brinofs  to  mind  the 
fiction  about  the  suppression  of  "  Social  Statics," 
which  did  duty  in  the  *S'^.  James  s  Grazette  and  the 
London  Times.  Here  is  the  advertisement  as  pub- 
lished at  the  head  of  D.  Appleton  &  Co.'s  announce- 
ments in  May,  1892: 

SOCIAL  STATICS.  By  Herbekt  Spencer.  New  and  revised 
edition,  including  "  The  Man  versus  the  State,"  a  series  of 
essays  on  political  tendencies  heretofore  puhlished  separately. 
12mo.    420  pages.     Cloth,  $2.00. 

Having  been  much  annoyed  by  the  persistent  quotation  from  the 
old  edition  of  "Social  Statics,"  in  the  face  of  repeated  warnings, 
of  views  which  lie  had  abandoned,  and  by  the  misquotation  of 
others  which  he  still  holds,  Mr.  Spencer  some  ten  years  ago  stopped 


134  RECANTATION. 

the  sale  of  the  book  in  England  and  prohibited  its  translation. 
But  tlae  rapid  spread  of  communistic  tlieories  gave  new  life  to  these 
misrepresentations;  hence  Mr.  ISpencer  decided  to  delay  no  longer 
a  statement  of  his  mature  opinions  on  the  rights  of  individuals 
and  the  duty  of  the  State. 

This  is  a  queer  statement  to  come  from  D.  Appleton 
&  Co.,  who  have  been  publishing  and  advertising  the 
old  edition  of  "  Social  Statics  "  up  to  this  year,  with- 
out the  slightest  warning  to  purchasers  that  the 
author  had  changed  his  views  otherwise  than  as 
stated  in  the  prefaces  and  notes,  which,  as  I  have 
before  said,  made  no  reference  to  any  change  on  the 
land  question.  It  is  strange  to  hear  from  them,  that 
the  annoyed  Mr.  Spencer  ten  years  ago  stopped  the 
sale  of  his  book  in  Enyland,  when  it  had  not  been 
in  print  for  over  twenty  years,  serenely  leaving  it  to 
be  sold  in  the  only  country  where  it  was  in  print, 
and  that  he  also  at  the  same  time  prohibited  its  trans- 
lation. Why  is  Mr.  Spencer  so  careful  of  what 
Englishmen  in  the  little  home  island  and  even  the 
"  foreigner  "  may  read,  yet  so  careless  of  what  is  read 
by  Americans,  Canadians  and  Australians  ?  And 
why  have  D.  Appleton  &  Co.,  for  nearly  ten  years, 
been  passing  off  on  their  great  constituency  a  book 
that  its  author  would  not  allow  to  be  sold  in  his  own 
home  or  in  foreign  countries  ?  These  are  questions 
this  advertisement  suggests  but  does  not  answer. 


CHAPTER   11. 

THE   PLACE   OF    "  JUSTICE  "    IN   THE   SYNTHETIC 
PHILOSOPHY. 

"  Justice,"  to  which  we  are  to  look  for  Mr. 
Spencer's  present  opinions  on  the  land  question,  is 
esteemed  by  its  author  his  most  important  book. 
This  volume,  the  full  title  of  which  is,  "  The 
Ethics  of  Social  Life  —  Justice,"  is  also  entitled 
"  Part  IV.  of  Ethics."  It  is  the  tenth  of  the  pon- 
derous volumes  already  published,  which  are  adver- 
tised as  "  Spencer's  Synthetic  Philosophy."  The 
grand  divisions  of  this  Synthetic  Philosophy,  as  now 
advertised,  are  :  "  First  Principles,"  "  The  Principles 
of  Biology,"  "  The  Principles  of  Psychology,"  "  Prin- 
ciples of  Sociology,"  and  "PrincijDles  of  Morality." 
Of  these  five  grand  divisions,  the  "  Principles  of 
Morality,"  as  it  is  styled  in  the  advertisements,  or 
"Principles  of  Ethics,"  as  it  is  styled  in  the  title- 
page  of  the  book  itself,  is  the  grand  division  to  which 
'"  Justice  "  belongs  in  the  Spencerian  scheme.  The 
first  volume  of  this  grand  division,  "  The  Data  of 
Ethics,"  has  been  already  published.  Volume  II., 
"  The  Inductions  of  Ethics,"  and  Volume  III.,  "The 
Ethics  of  Individual  Life,"  have  not  yet  appeared,^ 
Mr.  Spencer,  as  he  states  in  the  preface  to  "  Justice," 
preferring  to  hasten  this  volume,  as  most  important. 
After  these  two  deferred  volumes   have  been  com- 


i  They  have  been  published  since  this  was  put  in  plate. 


<^4 


136  RECANTATION. 

pleted,  there  are,  as  he  also  tells  us,  two  more 
volumes,  "  The  Ethics  of  Social  Life  —  Negative 
Benevolence,"  and  "  The  Ethics  of  Social  Life  — 
Positive  Benevolence,"  to  which  he  will  turn  his 
attention,    thus    completing    his    full    philosophical 

heme. 

This  scheme  of  "  Synthetic  Philosophy "  is  the 
most  pretentious  that  ever  mortal  man  undertook, 
since  it  embraces  no  less  than  an  explanation  to  man- 
kind, without  recourse  to  the  iiypothesis  of  Originating 
Litelligence,  of  how  the  world  and  all  that  is  in  it 
contained,  including  we  ourselves,  our  motives,  feel- 
ings, powers,  instincts,  habits  and  customs,  came  to 
be.  Of  this  large  scheme,  the  ethical  part  is  the 
most  important,  being,  as  Mr.  Spencer  tells  us,  "•  that 
to  which  I  regard  all  the  preceding  parts  as  subsidi- 
ary." And  of  this  most  important  part,  he  also  tells 
us  that  this  volume,  "  The  Ethics  of  Social  Life  — 
V^Justice,"  is  the  most  important. 

Thus  "  Justice,"  wdiich  so  far  as  it  treats  of  the 
land  question  w^e  are  about  to  consider,  is  by  its 
author  deemed  the  very  summit  and  cap-stone  of  his 
whole  philosophy. 

And  that,  indeed,  it  must  be,  follows  from  the 
supreme  importance  of  its  subject-matter.  For  it 
treats  of  right  and  wrong,  of  what  should  and  wliat 
should  not  be,  in  those  social  relations  of  men  from 
which  spring  the  most  fiercely  debated  practical 
questions  of  our  time  —  questions  that  involve  the 
happiness  or  misery,  the  physical,  mental  and  moral 
development  of  vast  populations,  the  advance  of  civ- 
ilization or  its  retrogression.  As  to  the  principles  of 
right  and  wrong  in  individual  relations  there  is  little 


THE   PLACE   OF    "JUSTICE."  137 

if  any  disjiute  ;  and  not  merely  througli  Christendom, 
but  "  from  Paris  to  Pekin,"  mankind  are  substantially 
agreed  as  to  what  constitutes  good  or  bad.  It  is 
when  we  come  to  the  social  relations  of  men  —  to 
those  social  adjustments  which  prescribe  and  control 
rights  of  ownership,  Avhich  affect  the  production,  dis- 
tribution, accumulation  and  enjoyment  of  wealth, 
whicli  are  the  main  ground  of  legislation,  and  which 
over  and  above  the  injunctions  of  individual  moral- 
it}'  throw  around  men  a  perfect  network  of  shalls 
and  shall  nots,  that  we  reach  the  befogged  and  debat- 
able land  —  the  i-egion  of  burning  questions. 

It  is  where  the  philosopher  thus  passes  from  the 
region  of  mere  curious  speculation  into  the  arena 
where,  for  men  living  and  men  yet  to  come,  the 
issues  of  want  or  plenty,  of  ignorance  or  enlighten- 
ment, of  slavery  or  freedom,  must  be  decided,  that 
the  ordinary  apprehension  may  best  apply  to  his 
teachings  the  tests  of  usef  idness  and  sincerity.  That 
the  proof  of  the  pudding  is  in  the  eating,  and  that  the 
tree  is  best  known  by  its  fruit,  are  maxims  not  to  be 
disregarded  in  philosophy.  Wliat  matters  the  teacli- 
ing  of  any  philosophy  as  to  the  origin  of  things, 
compared  with  its  teaching  on  matters  tliat  affect  the 
fullness,  happiness  and  nobleness  of  life?  And  how 
shall  we  tell  whether  the  philosopher  be  an  earnest 
man  or  a  mere  prater,  so  readily  and  so  clearly  as  by 
noting  whether  he  takes  the  side  of  wronger  or  of 
wronged,  the  undeservedly  rich  or  the  undeservedly 
poor?  Thus,  "Justice"  is  not  merely  the  roof  and 
crown  of  the  Spencerian  Synthetic  Philosophy ;  it  is 
its  touchstone  as  well. 


CHAPTER   III. 

THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY. 

I  WISH  to  keep  close  to  the  land  question.  But 
to  fairly  understand  Mr.  Spencer's  views  on  the  land 
question  as  expressed  in  "  Justice,"  and  to  discover 
what  ground  there  may  be  for  the  changes  they  show, 
it  is  necessary  to  get  some  idea  of  the  system  of  which 
it  is  the  crown. 

"  Justice "  is  in  fact  the  real  revision  of  "  Social 
Statics "  in  the  new  light  of  the  system  of  philoso- 
phy which  its  author  has  since  elaborated.  Both 
books  go  over  the  same  ground,  that  of  social  eco- 
nomics, and  the  title  of  one  might  serve  for  that  of 
the  other.  This  ground  it  was  that  first  attracted 
Mr.  Spencer,  and  he  went  over  it  forty-two  years 
ago  in  the  temper  of  a  social  reformer.  He  now  re- 
turns to  these  living,  burning  questions  of  the  time 
with  the  reputation  of  a  great  philosopher,  after 
assiduous  years  spent  in  what  purports  to  be  a  wider 
and  deeper  survey.  For  of  the  philosophy  which  he 
has  in  the  meantime  elaborated  it  is  claimed  not  only 
that  "it  is  more  logically  complete  than  any  other 
system,"  but  that  '*  it  is  more  practical  than  any  other, 
because  it  bears  immediately  upon  common  experi- 
ence, takes  hold  of  the  living  questions  of  the  time, 
throws  light  upon  the  course  of  human  affairs,  and 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  139 

gives  knowledge  that  may  serve  both  for  public  and 
individual  guidance."  ^ 

I  speak  of  Herbert  Spencer  in  "  Social  Statics " 
as  a  social  reformer,  to  distinguish  his  attitude  at  that 
time  from  his  present  attitude.  But  he  was  not  con- 
tent in  that  book  to  advocate  empirical  remedies  for 
the  disorder,  waste  and  wrong  that  he  beheld  about 
him.  He  saw  that  expediency  offered  no  sure  guide  ; 
that  such  was  the  infirmity  of  human  powers,  and 
such,  in  the  complexity  of  social  actions  and  reactions, 
was  the  impossibility  of  calculating  results,  that  legis- 
lation based  on  mere  policy  was  constantly  bringing 
to  naught  the  best-laid  schemes,  constantly  entan- 
gling men  in  blind  ways,  constantly  resulting  in  the 
unforeseen  and  unmshed.  The  burden  of  "Social 
Statics  "  is  that  there  is  a  better  guide  in  social  affairs 
than  the  calculations  of  expediency ;  that  what  men 
should  look  to  is  not  results  but  principles  ;  that  the 
moral  sense  may  be  trusted  where  the  intellect  is 
certain  to  go  astray.  Its  central  idea  is  that  the 
universe  bespeaks  to  us  its  origin  in  an  intelligence 
of  which  justice  must  be  an  attribute ;  that  there  is 
in  human  affairs  a  divinely  appointed  order  to  which, 
if  it  would  prosper,  society  must  conform ;  that 
there  is  an  eternal  rule  of  light,  by  which,  despite  all 
perturbations  of  the  intellect,  social  institutions  may 
be  safely  measured. 

This  rule  of  right,  as  expressed  in  the  first  prin- 
ciple of  "Social  Statics"  —  this  "law  of  equal  lib- 
erty," that  "  each  has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills 

1  E.  L.  Youraans,  M.D.,  "Herbert  Spencer  and  the  Doctrine 
of  Evolution,"  Popular  Science  Library.  D.  Appleton  &  Co., 
New  York. 


140  RECANTATION. 

provided  that  lie  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of 
any  other"  — what  is  it  indeed  but  an'  expression  in 
primary  essential  of  the  Golden  Rule  ?  What  Mr. 
Spencer  declared  in  "  Social  Statics  "  is  in  fact  what 
the  National  Assembly  of  France  declared  in  1789, 
"  That  ignorance,  neglect  or  contempt  of  human 
rights  are  the  sole  causes  of  public  misfortunes  and 
corruptions  of  government."  And  with  clearer  vision 
than  the  French  Assembly,  he  saw  and  did  not  hesi- 
tate to  assert  that  the  most  important  of  human  rights 
from  the  neglect  and  contempt  of  which  society  to- 
day suffers,  is  the  natural  and  equal  right  to  the  use 
of  the  planet. 

It  is  its  protest  against  materialism,  its  assertion 
of  the  supremacy  of  the  moral  law,  its  declaration  of 
God-o-iven  risfhts  that  are  above  all  human  enact- 
ments,  tliat  despite  whatever  it  may  contain  of  crudity 
and  inconsistency  make  "  Social  Statics "  a  noble 
book,  and  in  the  deepest  sense  a  religiously  minded 
book. 

In  the  course  Mr.  Spencer  thus  entered  in  his  early 
manhood  there  was  work  enough  to  have  engaged 
the  greatest  powers  for  the  longest  lifetime ;  but 
work  that  would  have  involved  a  constant  and  bitter 
contest  with  the  strongest  forces  —  forces  that  have 
at  their  disposal  not  only  the  material  things  that 
make  life  pleasant,  but  present  honor  as  well.  Mr. 
Spencer  did  not  continue  the  struggle  that  in  "Social 
Statics "  he  began.  He  turned  from  the  field  of 
social  reform  to  the  field  of  speculative  philosophy, 
in  which  he  has  won  great  reputation  and  authority. 
It  is  the  scheme  of  philosophy  thus  developed  that 
forms   the   basis   of    "Justice,"    as   the   ideas   of   a 


THE  SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  141 

living  God,  of  a  divinely  appointed  order,  and  of  an 
eternal  distinction  between  right  and  wrong,  just 
and  unjust,  form  the  basis  of  "  Social  Statics." 

In  its  earlier  volumes  this  philosophy  was  styled 
"  Spencer's  Evolutionary  Philosophy."  This  title 
has  since  been  abandoned  for  the  less  definite  but 
^lore  ambitious  one  of  "  Spencer's  Synthetic  Philoso- 
phy." Since  synthesis  is  the  opposite  of  analysis,  the 
putting  together,  instead  of  taking  apart  —  a  synthetic 
philosophy  is  a  philosophy  which  explains  the  world 
(a  term  which  in  the  philosophic  sense  includes  all 
of  which  we  can  become  conscious),  not  by  the  pro- 
cess of  taking  things  apart  and  seeing  of  what  they 
are  composed  ;  but  by  assuming  an  original  principle 
or  principles,  and  from  that  starting-point  mentally 
building  up  the  world,  thus  showing  how  it  came  to 
be.  The  Book  of  Genesis  embodies  probably  the 
oldest  synthetic  philosophy  we  have  record  of.  Mr. 
Spencer's  is  the  latest. 

Spencer's  "  Synthetic  Philosophy  "  is  in  the  main 
a  fusion  and  extension  of  two  hypotheses  —  the  neb- 
iilax_hy^)othesis -of-  the  foimation_x)f  cele&tial  bodies, 
and  what  is  best  known  as  the  Djirwinian  hypothesis 
of  the  development  of  .spacies^ with  a  bridging  over  of 
such  gulfs  as  the  passage  from  the  inorganic  to  the  or- 
ganic, and  from  matter  and  motion  to  mind,  and  some 
infusion  of  what  I  take  to  be  Kantian  metaphysics. 
Though  Mr.  Spencer  objects  to  the  characterization,  I 
can  only  describe  this  philosophy  as  materialistic,  since 
it  accounts  for  the  world  and  all  it  contains,  includ- 
ing the  human  ego,  by  the  interactions  of  matter  and 
motion,  without  reference  to  any  such  thing  as  intel- 
ligence, purpose  or  will,  except  as  derived  from  them. 


J 


142  RECANTATIOK. 

It  does  not,  of  course,  any  more  than  other  material- 
istic philosophies,  pretend  to  explain  what  matter 
and  motion  are,  or  how  they  came  to  be.  That,  for 
it,  is  the  unknowable,  while  it  only  deals  with  what 
may  be  known  by  men.  But  within  the  region  of 
the  knowable,  all  things  to  it  have  come  to  be,  or  are 
coming  to  be,  by  the  interactions  of  matter  and  mo- 
tion, in  a  process  which  it  terms  "  evolution,"  and 
which  it  describes  as  "  an  integration  of  matter,  and 
concomitant  dissipation  of  motion,  during  which  the 
matter  passes  from  an  indefinite,  incoherent  homo- 
geneity to  a  definite,  coherent  heterogeneity,  and 
during  wiiich  the  retained  motion  undergoes  a  parallel 
transformation." 

After  evolution  has  reached  its  limit  and  all  the 
motion  is  dissipated,  comes  a  temporary  equilibrium, 
and  then  dissolution  sets  in,  by  the  integration  of 
motion  and  the  dissipation  of  matter,  so  that,  accord- 
ing to  the  Synthetic  Philosophy,  the  universe  goes 
on,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  to  infinity,  like  one  of  those- 
disks  boys  play  with,  which  by  means  of  a  twisted 
string  is  made  to  spin  around  one  way,  then  to  come 
to  a  momentary  stop,  and  then  spin  back  the  other 
way,  the  process  continuing  so  long  as  the  boy  will 
gently  extend  and  then  gently  bring  together  his 
hands.  What  is  it  that  supplies  the  force  furnished 
in  the  case  of  the  toy  by  the  boy's  hands  ?  And  has 
it,  like  the  boy's  hands,  conscious  will  behind  it? 
This  to  the  Spencerian  Synthetic  Philosophy  is  the 
unknowable. 

This  unknowable  is  not  God,  though  Mr.  Spencer 
presents  it  to  the  religious  sentiment  as  something 
with  which  it  may  be  satisfied,  and  some  of  his  fol- 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  143 

lowers,  and  sometimes  even  lie  himself,  speak  of  it  iji 
ways  that  suggest  identity.  In  "  Social  Statics,"  how- 
ever, Mr.  Spencer  frequently  uses  the  term  God,  but 
ho  certainly  never  thought  that  he  knew  God  in  the 
sense  of  comprehending  Him,  or  that  it  was  possible 
for  man  so  to  know  Him.  And  if  the  unknowable 
of  his  philosophy  means  that  — 

Being  above  all  beings!     Mighty  One, 
Whom  none  can  coinpiehond  and  none  explore  ! 

Who  fill'st  existence  with  Tliyself  alone  — 
Embracing  all,  supporting,  ruling  o'er  — 
Being  whom  we  call  God,  and  know  no  moreli 

—  why  should  he,  with  the  development  of  his  i^hiloso- 
phy  have  abandoned  the  use  of  the  old  term  for  that 
which  beneath  the  myths  and  fables  and  creeds  by 
which  men  have  endeavored  to  formulate  spiritual  per- 
ceptions has  been  always  recognized  as  apparent  to 
the  human  soul  yet  transcending  human  knowledge  ? 
This  unknowable  must  be  distinguished  from  the 
unknown.  It  is  that  which  not  only  is  not,  but  never 
can  be  known  in  any  way ;  that  which  not  merely  we 
cannot  comprehend,  but  of  which  we  can  know  nothing 
at  all,  even  of  its  intellio-ence  or  non-intellis^ence,  its 
consciousness  or  non-consciousness,  its  nature  or  its 
attributes.  It  is  difficult  indeed  to  see  how  we  may 
l)redicate  even  existence  of  it,  as  we  may  of  an  un- 
known person  or  unknown  thing.  For  this  requires 
at  least  some  knowledge.  But  of  the  unknowable  we 
lack  the  capacity  of  knowing  anything  whatever.  Air 
is  unknowable  directly  to  our  sense  of  sight ;  we  can- 
not directly  see  air.  But  by  its  resistance,  its  weight, 
its  chemical  and  other  qualities,  it  is  knowable  by  our 

^  Derzhavin,  Bowring's  translation. 


144  RECANTATIOK. 

other  faculties  ;  and  it  is  indirectly  knowable  even  to 
our  sight,  through  the  moving  of  leaves,  the  motion 
of  watery  surfaces,  etc.  ;  while  if  air  were  unknow- 
able, we  could  not  be  conscious  of  it  in  any  possible 
way.     It  would  be  precisely  the  same  to  us  as  no  air. 

By  the  constitution  of  the  human  mind  it  is  im- 
possible for  us  in  attempting  to  trace  back  the  line 
of  causation  to  find  any  stopping  place  until  we  reach 
that  which  thinks  and  wills — that  to  which  the 
volition  is  akin  which  to  our  consciousness  is  an 
originating  element  in  the  trains  of  sequences  that  we 
ourselves  set  in  motion,  or  at  least  modify  and  divert. 
Thus  any  materialistic  or  mechanical  philosophy  must 
either  beg  the  question  by  assuming  the  eternity  of 
matter  and  motion,  or  admit  something  behind  them 
wliich  it  must  take  for  granted  and  leave  out  of  its 
exj)lanation,  simply  denying  that  it  can  be  recognized 
as  intelligence  or  will  apart  from  matter  and  motion, 
i.e.  spirit.  If  the  unknowable  in  the  Spencerian 
Philosophy  means  anything  more  than  the  vacuum 
that  is  thus  left  where  a  spiritual  First  Cause  is 
denied,  it  seems  to  mean  what  by  some  metaphysicians 
is  styled  "  the  thing  in  itself." 

This  "  thing  in  itself  "  is  in  metaphysical  language 
the  noumenon  as  distinguished  from  the  phenomenon : 
the  thing  as  it  really  is,  as  distinguished  from  the 
thing  as  it  is  recognized  in  its  qualities  by  the  per- 
cipient being.  But  this,  if  not  another  name  for 
spirit,  really  amounts  to  vacancy.  Such  idea  of  "  the 
thing  in  itself  "  as  opposed  to  the  thing  as  known 
in  phenomena,  seems  to  come  from  the  habit,  to 
which  our  use  of  language  leads,  of  associating  in- 
dependent existence  with  qualities  to  which  we  give 


THE   SYNTHETIC    PHILOSOPHY.  145 

independent  names.  Thus  no  man  ever  saw  white 
except  as  a  white  thing.  But  as  things  have  other 
colors  we  can  readily  separate  the  idea  white  from  the 
idea  thing.  Forgetting,  since  we  are  only  dealing 
with  words,  that  the  abstraction  of  one  color  implies 
its  replacement  by  another  color,  and  the  abstraction 
of  all  colors  would  render  the  thing  non-existent  so 
far  at  least  as  our  sight  is  concerned,  we  may  men- 
tally separate  the  idea  of  color,  and  imagine  the  thing 
in  other  respects  as  remaining.  Extending  the  pro- 
cess of  abstraction  to  all  other  qualities,  we  may  fancy 
that  we  have  still  remaining  the  idea  of  the  thing 
separated  from  all  idea  of  its  qualities.  But  what  we 
have  remaining  is  really  only  a  verbal  simulacrum, 
that  sounds  like  something,  and  may  be  written  or 
parsed,  but  which  on  analysis  consists  of  negations, 
and  means  really  no  thing  or  nothing.  This,  as 
well  as  I  can  understand  it,  is  that  "  thing  in  itself," 
of  Avhich,  in  some  part,  or  in  some  aspects,  Mr. 
Spencer's  unknowable  seems  to  consist. 

But  if  the  Spencerian  philosophy  is  thus  indefinite 
as  to  what  precedes  or  underlies  matter  and  motion, 
it  certainly  shows  no  lack  of  definiteness  from  the 
appearance  of  matter  and  motion  onward.  With 
matter  and  motion  begins  its  knowable,  and  from 
thenceforward,  without  pause  or  break,  it  builds  up 
the  whole  universe  by  the  integration  of  the  one,  and 
tlie  dissipation  of  the  other,  in  the  mode  described  as 
evolution,  without  recourse  to  any  other  element. 

In  this  elimination  of  any  spiritual  element  lies,  it 
seems  to  me,  the  essential  characteristic  of  the  Spen- 
cerian philosophy.  It  is  not,  as  is  largely  supposed, 
the  evolution  philosophy,  but  an  evolution  philoso2)hj 


146  RECANTATION. 

that  is  to  say,  its  rejection  of  any  spiritual  element 
in  its  account  of  the  genesis  of  things  does  not  follow 
from  its  acceptance  of  the  principle  of  evolution ;  but 
the  peculiarity  of  its  teachings  as  to  evolution  arises 
from  its  ignoring  of  the  spiritual  element,  from  its 
assumption  that,  matter  and  motion  given,  their  inter- 
actions will  account  for  all  that  we  see,  feel  or  know. 
In  reality  the  Spencerian  idea  of  evolution  differs  as 
widely  from  that  held  by  such  evolutionists  as  Alfred 
Russell  Wallace,  St.  George  Mivart,  or  Joseph  Le 
Conte,  as  it  differs  from  the  idea  of  special  and  direct 
creation.  It  is  only  when  this  is  recognized  that  the 
real  point  of  issue  raised  by  or  perhaps  rather  around 
the  doctrine  of  evolution  is  seen.  We  all  see  that  the 
oak  is  evolved  from  the  acorn,  the  man  from  the  child. 
And  that  it  is  intended  for  the  evolution  of  somethinor 
is  the  only  intelligible  account  that  we  can  make  for 
ourselves  of  the  universe.  Thus  in  some  sense  we 
all  believe  in  evolution,  and  in  some  sense  the  vast 
majority  of  men  always  have.  And  even  the  evolu- 
tion of  man  from  the  animal  kingdom  offers  no  real 
difficulty  so  long  as  this  is  understood  as  only  the 
form  or  external  of  his  genesis.  To  me,  for  instance, 
who,  possibly  from  my  ignorance  of  such  branches, 
am  unable  to  see  the  weight  of  the  evidence  of  man's 
descent  from  other  animals,  which  many  specialists  in 
natural  science  deem  conclusive,  it  yet  appears  ante- 
cedently probable  that  externally  such  might  have 
been  his  descent.  For  it  seems  better  to  accord 
with  the  economy  manifested  through  nature,  to 
think  that  when  the  soul  of  man  first  took  encase- 
ment in  physical  bod}^  on  this  earth  it  should  have 
taken  the  form  nearest  to  its  needs,  rather  than  that 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  147 

inorganic  matter  should  be  built  up.  And  while  I 
cannot  conceive  how,  even  in  illimitable  time,  the 
animal  could  of  itself  turn  into  the  man,  it  is  easy 
for  me  to  think  that  if  the  spirit  of  man  passed  into 
the  body  of  a  brute  the  animal  body  would  soon 
assume  human  shape. 

Let  me  illustrate  the  distinction  I  wish  to  point 
out : 

Here  is  a  locomotive  of  the  first  class,  or  a  great 
Corliss  engine,  capable  on  the  pressure  of  a  child's 
finger  of  exerting  to  definite  ends  a  mighty  force. 
How  did  it  come  to  be  ? 

"  It  came  to  be,"  some  one  might  answer,  "  from 
the  integrations  of  matter  and  motion.  This  matter 
existed,  not  to  go  further  back  than  is  necessary,  in 
ores  of  iron  and  copper  and  zinc,  and  in  the  wood 
of  trees.  By  motion  acting  on  matter  these  materials 
were  transported,  separated,  combined  and  adjusted, 
until  integrated  into  this  definite,  coherent  heteroge- 
neity that  you  see."     " 

Such  answer  would  not  satisfy  me.  I  would  in- 
deed see  that  it  was  quite  true  that  from  the  first 
wresting  of  the  ores  from  their  beds,  to  the  last  touch 
of  file  or  emery  paper,  every  step  in  this  construction 
involved  the  action  of  motion  on  matter;  but  I  would 
know  that  this  was  not  all,  and  that  what  so  ordered 
and  directed  the  action  of  motion  on  matter  as  to 
bring  this  construction  into  being  was  the  intelligence 
and  volition  of  man.  And  I  would  reply,  "You  do 
not  go  deep  enough  :  wliat  this  construction  really 
bespeaks  is  sometliing  you  have  omitted ;  something 
to  whicli  matter  is  but  the  material,  and  motion  the 
tool  —  the  intelligence,  consciousness  and  freedom  of 
human  will." 


148  RECANTATION. 

Or,  liere  is  a  picture.  Let  it  be  a  reproduction  of 
a  Madonna  of  Raphael's,  such  as  are  made  or  might 
be  made  by  self-feeding  presses.  Shall  an}'-  one  ex- 
plain the  impression  of  grace  and  beauty  and  loving 
purity  that  it  produces  on  him  who  contemplates  it,  by 
explaining  on  the  undulatory  theory  of  light  how  im- 
pressions of  color  are  produced  on  the  retina  of  the 
eye  ?  Or  shall  he  account  for  its  genesis  by  telling 
me  that  by  integrations  of  matter  and  motion  certain 
pigments  have  become  disposed  on  paper  in  a  certain 
way  ?  Should  he  attempt  to  do  so  I  would  say  to 
him,  *'You  are  telling  me  merely  of  the  medium 
through  which  in  this  picture  soul  speaks  to  soul ;  you 
are  merely  telling  me  of  the  means  by  which  the 
thought  of  the  painter  found  expression  in  outward 
form." 

But  suppose  he  should  answer  — 

"You  delude  yourself.  I  have  investigated  the 
matter,  and  have  been  to  the  place  where  such  pic- 
tures as  this  are  brought  forth.  I  saw  no  painter  ;  I 
saw  only  a  series  of  revolving  cylinders,  through 
which  an  endless  roll  of  paper  was  drawn  by  steel 
fingers.  By  the  automatic  motion  of  this  machinery 
one  cylinder  impressed  on  the  paper  some  patches  of 
one  color,  and  another  some  patches  of  another  color, 
till  at  last,  by  such  successive  actions  of  motion  on 
matter,  a  picture  like  this  came  forth." 

Would  I  be  any  more  convinced  that  such  a  pic- 
ture could  have  come  to  be  without  that  power,  essen- 
tially different  from  matter  and  motion,  which  we 
feel  in  ourselves  and  recognize  in  other  men,  which 
draws  a  deep  gulf  between  man  and  all  other  animals ; 
that   power  which   plans,    contrives,    and   by  using 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOrHY.  149 

matter  and  motion  creates  ;  that  power  in  short  which 
we  call  spirit?  Would  I  not  say  to  him,  "What  you 
tell  me  of  the  way  this  picture  was  brought  forth  by 
no  means  lessens  my  certain t}^  that  it  could  prima- 
rily have  originated  only  in  the  mind  and  soul  of 
a  painter,  but  only  shows  me  in  the  automatic  working 
of  the  presses  of  which  you  speak  a  higher  expression 
of  the  same  power  of  using  tools  to  body  forth  thought 
that  was  shown  in  the  use  of  palette  and  brush.  In 
this  reproduction,  as  in  each  and  all  of  the  various 
processes  and  machines  by  which  it  was  brought  to 
be,  I  see  a  manifestation  of  the  same  essential  thing 
that  the  original  picture  would  show  to  me  —  origi- 
nating will,  adapting  mind ;  in  short,  not  matter  and 
motion,  but  spirit,  or  soul. 

And  of  what  moment  would  be  the  question 
whether  this  picture  came  into  existence  by  the 
direct  action  of  human  will  upoii  the  paper,  or  indi- 
rectly through  its  action  upon  automatic  machinery, 
as  compared  with  the  question  whether  its  existence 
involved  human  action  or  not  ? 

It  is  on  this  vital  point  of  the  existence  or  non- 
existence of  spirit  as  a  prime  motor  that  the  real 
issue  raised  by  theories  of  evolution  comes.  Such 
evolutionism  as  is  represented  by  the  men  of  whom  I 
have  spoken,  sees  in  evolution  only  a  mode  in  which 
the  creative  spirit  works.  Such  evolutionism  as  is 
formulated  in  the  Spencerian  philosophy  eliminates 
spirit  from  its  hypothesis,  and  takes  into  account 
only  matter  and  motion. 

Here  is  where  all  materialistic  or  mechanical  theo- 
ries of  the  universe  ultimately  fail.  The  belief  in 
God,  that  is  to  say,  in  a  Spiritual  Originator,  has  no 


150  RECANTATION. 

such  utterly  inadequate  and  ridiculous  genesis  as  that 
which  we  shall  shortly  see  Mr.  Spencer  gives  for  it. 
It  springs  from  the  same  primary  ineradicable  percep- 
tion that  universally  leads  men,  whenever  they  see 
in  a  thing  destitute  of  life  the  evidence  of  adaj:)- 
tation  involving  choice,  to  attribute  it  to  man. 
No  civilized  man,  after  inspection,  ever  took  the 
rudest  huts  raised  by  savages  for  the  structures  of 
lower  animals.  No  savage  Avho  might  at  a  distance 
have  thought  a  ship  a  bird,  or  a  steamer  a  marine 
monster,  ever  failed  on  closer  view  to  know  that 
it  was  of  man's  building.  No  wandering  Bedouin 
ever  attributed  to  natural  forces  ruins  so  vast  that 
they  transcended  his  ideas  of  man's  ability.  On  the 
contrary,  so  clear  is  the  impress  and  testimony  of 
that  creative  power  which  so  widely  and  unmistak- 
ably distinguishes  man  from  all  other  animals,  that 
rude  peoples  invariably  attribute  constructions  which 
they  deem  beyond  man's  ability,  to  genii,  fairies  or 
demons — beings  possessing  powers  of  the  same  kind 
as  man,  but  in  larger  degree.  And  they  do  this  for 
the  same  reason  that  they  attribute  the  bringing  into 
being  of  the  highest  of  adaptations,  those  that  embody 
life,  to  a  highest  of  spiritual  beings  —  the  Great 
Spirit,  or  God.  And  when  our  larger  knowledge 
shows  us  no  wavering  or  confusion  in  the  line  which 
marks  conscious  adaptation,  so  that  to  the  specialist 
the  chipping  of  a  flint  taken  from  a  long  buried 
river-drift,  or  the  scratching  on  a  tusk  of  a  pre- 
glacial  animal,  shows  the  same  unmistakable  evidence 
of  man's  work  as  does  the  engine  or  the  picture,  how 
shall  we  otherwise  interpret  the  evidences  of  design 
similar  in  kind  but  infinitely  higher  in  degree  which 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  151 

nature  on  every  hand  reveals  than  as  indicating  the 
work  of  God  ? 

But  to  return  again  to  our  illustration :  If  when, 
to  him  who  contends  that  the  engine  or  the  picture 
has  come  to  be  by  the  integrations  of  matter  and 
motion,  I  say  that  such  structures  unmistakably  be- 
speak man's  work,  suppose  he  should  reply  to  me : 

"  What  is  man's  work  but  the  interaction  of  matter 
and  motion?  What  is  man's  hand  but  a  certain 
arrangement  of  matter?  What  is  the  force  it  exerts 
but  a  dissipation  of  motion?  Did  they,  too,  not  exist 
in  an  indefinite,  incoherent  homogeneous  shape  in 
the  primordial  mass  ?  Do  they  not  come  to  man 
from  unnumbered  transmutations  in  the  food  he  eats, 
the  water  he  druiks,  the  air  he  breathes;  to  pass  from 
him  into  other  numberless  mutations?  If  you  think 
man  is  not  included  in  matter  and  motion,  shut  off 
even  for  a  little  while  his  supplies  of  matter  and 
motion,  and  where  is  your  man  ?  " 

"  Your  explanation  no  better  satisfies  me  than 
before,"  I  would  reply.  "While  it  may  be  true  as 
far  as  it  goes,  it  is  inadequate  and  false  in  omitting 
an  essential  factor,  and  that  a  factor  which  is  not 
last  but  first.  Matter  and  motion  acting  to  "all  eter- 
nity could  not  bring  forth  such  a  structure  as  this. 
I  know,  from  all  my  experience  of  how  things  come 
to  be,  that  this  structure  had  its  primary  genesis  in 
thought ;  that  in  all  its  parts,  and  as  a  combined 
whole,  it  was  thought  out  before  it  was  worked  out. 
I  grant  you  that,  at  least  normally,  our  percej)tions 
of  thought  in  others  are  dependent  on  our  percep- 
tions of  matter  and  motion.  But  I  too  think.  And  I 
know  from  perceptions  that  are  even  closer  and  truer 


152  IlECANTATION. 

than  my  })erce[)tions  of  matter  and  motion,  that 
thought  is  sometliing.  different  from  matter  and 
motion,  and  from  any  combination  of  them.  I  think 
wlien  my  body  is  still,  when  my  eyes  are  shut,  even 
when  my  senses  are  locked  from  the  external  world 
by  sleep.  And  though  I  can  only  look  out,  not  in  ; 
though  I  cannot  tell  you  what  I  myself  am,  any 
more  than  you  can  tell  me  what  matter  and  motion 
are ;  although  I  can  no  more  tell  you  how  I  came  to 
be  than  you  can  tell  me  how  matter  and  motion  came 
to  be,  nor  in  what  way  this,  that  I  feel  is  I,  is  em- 
bodied in  a  material  frame,  I  do  feel  directly,  and 
know  from  its  capacities,  that  it  is  something  different 
from  and  superior  to  the  matter  and  motion  of  that 
frame,  and  that  it  endures  while  they  change.  And 
so  your  explanation  of  the  genesis  of  things  that 
excludes  everything  but  matter  and  motion,  is  to  me 
as  superficial  as  if  you  were  to  explain  a  Ceesar  or 
Shakespeare  by  the  food  he  ate  ;  an  '  In  Memoriam  ' 
by  pen  and  ink ;  or  my  recognition  of  my  friend's 
voice,  and  our  communication  of  thouGfht  throusfh 
the  telephone,  by  the  copper  wire  and  the  current  of 
electricity. 

"  So  clear,  so  certain,  am  I  that  what  I  can  recognize, 
better  than  I  can  define,  as  spirit,  is  alone  competent 
to  produce  things  in  which  I  see  conscious,  willing 
intelligence,  that  if  you  were  to  show  me  a  brush 
that  seemed  of  itself  to  paint  pictures,  a  pen  that 
seemed  of  itself  to  write  intelligible  words,  or  even 
an  animal  that  seemed  to  show  that  power  which  is  the 
essential  characteristic  of  man,  I  could  only  account 
for  it  as  a  manifestation  of  spirit  acting  in  a  way 
unfamiliar  to  me  — -  if  not  spirit  in  a  human  body, 


THE    SYNTHETIC    PHILOSOPHY.  153 

playing  a  trick  upon  me,  then  spirit  in  some  other 
form.  And  this  would  be  the  conclusion  of  all  men." 
While  less  acute  thinkers  profess  to  sneer  at  the 
evidence  from  design,  Schopenhauei",  whose  great 
ability  certainly  entitles  him  to  high  rank  among 
atheistic  philosophers,  is  only  able  to  avoid  the  con- 
clusion of  an  Originating  Intelligence  by  eliminating 
intelligence  from  will,  and  assuming  that  bare  will, 
or  desire  unconjoined  with  intelligence,  directl}^  origi- 
nates, just  as  the  will  to  make  a  bodily  movement 
brincrs  about  that  movement  without  knowledge  or 
consciousness  of  how  it  is  brought  about.^ 

1  Scliopenliauer's  explanation  of  the  origin  of  species  is  in  inter- 
esting contrast  to  that  of  the  evolutionary  hypothesis,  and  to  my 
mind  comes  closer  to  the  truth.  According  to  him  the  numberless 
forms  and  adaptations  of  animated  nature,  instead  of  proceeding 
from  slow  modifications,  by  which  various  creatures  have  been 
adapted  to  their  conditions,  are  the  expression  of  the  desire  or  col- 
lective volition  of  the  animal.  I  quote  from  the  chapter  on  Com- 
parative Anatomy  in  "  The  Will  in  Nature,"  Bohn  translation: 

Every  animal  form  is  a  longing  of  the  will  to  live  which  is  roused 
by  circumstances.  For  instance,  the  will  is  seized  with  a  longing  to 
live  on  trees,  to  hang  on  their  branches,  to  devour  their  leaves, 
without  contention  with  other  animals  and  without  ever  touching 
the  ground.  This  longing  presents  itself  throughout  endless  time 
in  tiie  form  (or  Platonic  idea)  of  the  sloth.  It  can  hardly  walk 
at  all,  being  only  adapted  for  climbing;  helpless  on  the  ground  it 
is  agile  on  trees  and  looks  itself  like  a  moss-clad  bough  in  onler  to 
escape  the  notice  of  its  pursuers.  .  .  . 

The  universal  fitness  for  their  ends,  the  obviously  intentional 
design  of  all  the  parts  of  the  organism  of  the  lower  animals  with- 
out exception,  proclaim  too  distinctly  for  it  ever  to  have  been 
seriously  questioned,  that  here  no  forces  of  Nature  acting  by 
chance  and  without  plan  have  been  at  work,  but  a  will.  .  .  .  [That] 
no  organ  interferes  with  another,  each  rather  assisting  the  others 
and  none  remaining  uneni]>!()yed;  also  tliat  no  subordinate  organ 
would  be  better  suited  to  ani)tiier  mode  of  existiuiee,  wliiic  the  life 
which  the  animal  really  leads  is  determined  by  the  principal  organs 
alone,  but  on  the  contrary  each  jiart  of  the  animal  not  only  cor- 
responds to  every  other  part,  but  also  to  its  mode  of  life:  its  claws 
for  instance  are  invariably  adapted  for  seizing  the  prey  which  its 
teeth  are  suited  to  tear  and  break,  and  its  intestinal  canal  to  digest; 


154  RECANTATION. 

But  within  the  sphere  in  which  we  can  trace  ori- 
gination does  it  anywhere  appear  that  will  without 
intelligence   can   accomplish   anything  ?     So   far   as 


its  limbs  are  constructed  to  convey  it  where  that  prey  is  to  be 
found,  and  no  organ  evei'  remains  unemiiloyed  .  .  .  added  to  tlie 
circumstance  that  no  organ  required  for  its  mode  of  life  is  ever 
wanting  in  any  animal,  and  that  all,  even  the  most  lieterogeneous, 
harmonize  together  and  are  as  it  were  calculated  for  a  quite 
specially  determined  way  of  life,  for  the  element  in  which  the 
prey  dwells,  for  the  pursuit,  the  overcoming,  the  crushing  and 
tligesting  of  that  prey  —  all  this, we  say,  proves  that  the  animal's 
structure  has  been  determined  by  the  mode  of  life  by  which  the 
animal  desired  to  find  its  sustenance,  and  not  vice  versa.  It  also 
proves  that  the  I'esult  is  exactly  the  same  as  if  a  knowledge  of  that 
mode  of  life  and  of  its  outward  conditions  had  preceded  the 
structure,  and  as  if  therefore  every  animal  had  chosen  its  equip- 
ment before  it  assumed  a  body;  just  as  a  sportsman  before  starting 
chooses  his  whole  equipment,  gun,  powder,  shot,  pouch,  hunting- 
knife  and  dress,  according  to  the  game  he  intends  chasing.  He 
does  not  take  aim  at  the  wild  boar  because  he  happens  to  have  a 
ritle;  he  took  the  rifle  with  him  and  not  a  fowling-piece,  because  he 
intended  to  hunt  the  wild  boar.  The  ox  does  not  butt  because  it 
happens  to  have  horns ;  it  has  horns  because  it  intends  to  butt. 

Now  to  render  this  proof  complete  we  have  the  additional  circum- 
stance that  in  many  animals,  diu'ing  the  time  they  are  growing, 
the  effort  of  the  will  to  which  a  limb  is  destined  to  minister,  mani- 
fests itself  before  the  existence  of  the  limb  itself,  its  employment 
thus  anticipating  its  existence.  Young  he-goats,  rams,  calves,  for 
instance,  butt  with  their  bare  polls  before  they  have  any  horns; 
the  young  boar  tries  to  gore  on  either  side,  before  its  tusks  are 
fully  developed  which  would  respond  to  the  intended  eifect,  wliile 
on  the  other  hand  it  neglects  to  use  the  smaller  teeth  it  already  has 
in  its  mouth  and  with  which  it  might  really  bite.  Thus  its  mode 
of  defending  itself  does  not  adapt  itself  to  the  existing  weapons, 
but  vice  versa. 

.  .  .  Behold  the  countless  varieties  of  animal  shapes.  How  en- 
tirely is  each  of  them  the  mere  image  of  its  volition,  the  evident  ex- 
pression of  the  strivings  of  the  will  which  constitute  its  character! 
Their  difference  in  shape  is  only  the  portrait  of  their  difference  in 
character.  .  .  .  Each  particular  striving  of  the  will  presents  itself 
in  a  particular  modification  of  shape.  The  abode  of  the  prey  there- 
fore has  determined  the  shape  of  its  pursuer  .  .  .  and  no  shape  is 
rejected  by  the  will  to  live  as  too  grotesque  to  attain  its  ends.  .  .  . 
As  the  will  has  equipped  itself  with  every  organ  and  every  weapon, 
offensive  as  well  as  defensive,  so  has  it  likewise  provided  itself  in 
every  animal  shape  with  an  intellect,  as  a  means  of  preservation 
for  tlie  individual  and  the  species.  .  .  .  Beasts  of  prey  do  not- hunt 
nor  foxes  thieve  because  they  have  more  intelligence  ;  on  the  con- 
trary they  have  more  intelligence,  just  as  they  have  stronger  teeth 
and  claws,  because  they  wished  to  live  by  hunting  and  thieving. 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  155 

we  can  see  clearly,  is  it  not  alwa3^s  true  that  M'here 
volition  without  commensurate  intelligence  seems  to 
result  in  accomplislnnent  it  is  because  the  needed 
intelligence  has  been  supplied  by  another  will.  Thus 
an  engine-driver  desires  his  train  to  move  forward  or 
backward,  fast  or  slow,  and  by  a  motion  that  seems 
directly  responsive  to  his  will,  his  desire  takes  effect 
through  the  pulling  of  a  lever.  He  may  know  noth- 
ing of  the  adjustments  of  the  machine  that  in  re- 
sponse to  his  will  thus  converts  heat  into  motion, 
and  utterly  lack  the  intelligence  needed  to  construct 
it.  But  that  knowledge  and  intelligence  were  none 
the  less  necessary  to  this  moving  of  the  train.  If 
not  conjoined  with  his  will  they  were  conjoined  with 
other  wills  —  the  wills  that  have  constructed  a  ma- 
chine by  which  a  train  may  be  moved  on  the  pulling 
of  a  lever.  The  little  intelligence  needed  in  use 
proves  the  great  intelligence  exerted  in  construction. 

So  a  lady  at  the  opera  puts  her  glass  to  her  eyes 
and  turns  a  screw  as  she  wishes  to  make  what  she 
sees  appear  nearer.  She  may  not  know  how  many 
lenses  her  glass  contains  ;  still  less  tlieir  nature  and 
properties ;  and  is  utterly  without  the  knowledge 
required  for  making  such  glasses.  But  that  she  may 
accomplish  at  will  results  requiring  such  knowledge 
is  because  others  possess  it. 

So,  if  we  look  through  any  part  of  the  wide  field 
in  which  human  advance  has  brought  volition  nearer 
to  result  and  lessened  the  knowledge  and  intelli- 
gence required  by  the  will  to  use,  we  find  its  reason 
in  the  greater  knowledge  and  intelligence  sliown  in 
adaptation.  If  the  ordinary  ship-master  of  to-day 
can  with  the  aid  of  a  quadrant,  a  nautical  almanac 


156  RECANTATION. 

and  a  table  of  logarithms  learn  from  the  heavens  his 
position  on  the  trackless  ocean,  it  is  because  of  the 
high  intelligence  and  tireless  studies  of  others.  If 
girls  who  know  only  how  to  strike  a  key  and  inter- 
pret a  click,  or  put  a  peg  in  a  hole,  can  talk  with 
each  other  hundreds  of  miles  apart,  it  is  because  of 
discoverers,  inventors  and  constructors. 

If,  then,  in  the  only  field  in  which  we  can  see  ori- 
gination taking  place,  we  find  that  the  originator  is 
always  intelligent,  conscious  will,  and  if  we  find  that 
where  the  will  that  uses  an  adapation  does  not  pos- 
sess the  knowledge  or  intelligence  necessary  to  ori- 
ginate it,  another  will  or  wills  conjoined  with  deeper 
knowledge  and  wider  intelligence  has  done  so,  what 
is  the  reasonable  inference  as  to  adaptations  of  a 
higher  kind,  the  genesis  of  which  we  cannot  see,  and 
which  so  far  transcend  the  knowledge  and  intelli- 
gence of  the  creatures  that  through  them  are  enabled 
to  give  their  own  wills  effect? 

What  are  our  bodies  but  a  more  perfect  adjust- 
ment of  parts,  such  as  we  see  in  machines  ?  what  are 
our  eyes  but  a  more  perfect  adjustment  of  lenses, 
such  as  we  see  in  opera-glasses  ?  If,  then,  my  hand 
closes  when  I  will  to  grasp,  without  any  knowledge 
on  my  part  of  the  correlated  movements  that  must 
necessarily  intervene ;  if  when  I  merel}^  will  to  look, 
the  lenses  of  my  eyes  are  by  delicate  and  complex 
machinery  directed  to  the  position  and  adapted  to 
the  distance ;  if  all  through  animal  and  even  vegetable 
nature  I  may  see  utilizations  of  knowledge  and  adap- 
tations of  intelligence  transcending,  not  merely  the 
powers  of  their  users,  but  the  highest  human  knowl- 
edge and  intelligence,  shall  I  infer  that  these  ntiliza- 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  157 

tions  and  adaptations  come  witliont  knowledge  and 
intelligence  ?  or  shall  I  regard  tlieni  as  evidences  of 
a  deeper  knowledge  and  wider  intelligence,  which, 
since  we  find  intelligence  and  knowledge  invariably 
associated  with  consciousness,  must  pertain  to  a 
higher  consciousness  ? 

But  to  come  back  to  the  Book  of  Genesis  that  is 
offered  to  us  in  Mr.  Spencer's  Synthetic  Philosophy. 

First  —  if  we  will  insist  upon  a  first  —  comes  the 
unknowable ;  then  force ;  then  from  force,  matter  and 
motion.  Matter  first  appears,  permeated  with  motion, 
in  a  state  of  indefinite,  incoherent  homogeneity,  from 
which  a  principle  which  is  styled  "  the  instability  of 
the  homogeneous  "  starts  the  "  integration  of  matter 
and  concomitant  dissipation  of  motion,"  called  evolu- 
tion, "  during  which  the  matter  passes  from  an  indefi- 
nite, incoherent  homogeneity  to  a  definite,  coherent 
heterogeneity,  and  during  which  the  retained  motion 
undergoes  a  parallel  transformation." 

This  is  in  brief  the  whole  story: 

Matter  revolving  in  accordance  with  the  nebular 
hypothesis  gives  rise  to  nebulous  aggregations ;  these 
to  suns,  which  throw  off  revolving  satellites,  that 
in  the  course  of  time  cool  into  earths,  on  the  crust 
of  which  continuing  evolution  separates  gases  and 
differentiates  the  strata  of  inorganic  matter.  By  the 
multiplying  effects  of  motion  acting  on  matter,  the 
earth  becomes  fitted  for  life ;  and  from  the  differences 
in  the  physical  mobilities  and  chemical  activities  in 
the  segregations  of  matter  produce  in  colloid  or  jelly- 
like substances,  such  as  starch,  the  beginnings  of  life, 
which  is  defined  as  "  the  definite  combination  of  het>- 
erogeneous  changes,  both  simultaneous  and  successive, 


158  BECANTATION. 

in  correspondence  with  external  co-existences  and  se- 
quences." And  then  by  forces  of  various  kinds,  but 
all  derived  from  motion,  and  being  its  mechanical 
equivalents,  all  the  forms  of  life,  vegetable  and  ani- 
mal, proceed. 

By  this  process  of  evolution  man  was  finally  de- 
veloped from  a  lower  animal  —  he  himself,  with  all 
his  attributes  and  social  institutions,  being  like  every- 
thing else  an  outcome  of  this  process,  which,  acting 
through  survival  of  the  fittest,  heredity  and  the  j^ress- 

.  ure  of  conditions,  has  been  and  is  moulding  him  into 

Vharmony  with  those  conditions. 

Of  primitive  man  we  have  much  and  very  definite 
information  from  Mr.  Spencer.  He  was  smaller  and 
less  powerful,  especially  in  the  lower  limbs,  than 
man  is  now,  but  had  a  larger  abdomen  and  came 
earlier  to  maturity.  He  was  wavering  and  incon- 
stant ;  he  had  no  surprise  or  curiosity  or  ingenuity ; 
his  imagination  was  reminiscent  only,  not  construc- 
tive ;  he  lacked  abstract  ideas,  was  without  notion  of 
definiteness  and  truth,  or  of  benevolence,  equity  or 
duty ;  he  was  unable  to  think  even  of  a  single  law, 
much  less  of  law  in  general ;  had  neither  the  habit 
of  expressing  things  definitely,  nor  the  habit  of  test- 
ing assertions,  nor  a  due  sense  of  contrast  between 
fact  and  fiction ;  and  for  him  to  deliberately  weigh 
evidence  was  impossible.  He  was  a  cannibal;  was 
entirely  promiscuous  in  his  sexual  relations;  had  no 
idea  of  any  other  life  or  of  any  supernatural  exist- 
ences or  powers,  and  no  care  for,  no  sympathy  with, 
and  no  idea  of  the  goodness  or  badness  of  acts  toward 
any  of  his  fellows,  except  so  far  as  female  primi- 
tive man  was  concerned  with  her  offspring  during 
infancy. 


THE   SYNTHETIC    rHILOSOPHY.  159 

How  this  sorry  monster,  this  big-bellied,  short- 
legged,  bad  lot  of  an  ancestor  of  ours  managed  to 
avoid  the  fate  of  the  Kilkenny  cats,  and  keep  in 
existence,  we  are  not  definitely  informed ;  bnt  it 
seems  from  the  Synthetic  Pliilosophy  that  he  did, 
and  went  on  evoluting. 

Various  processes  of  his  further  evolution  are  in 
the  Synthetic  Philosophy  described.  Seeing  shadows 
cast  by  the  sun,  the  primitive  man  took  them  for 
other  selves,  which,  aided  by  his  dreams,  brought 
him  to  a  belief  in  doubles,  more  extensive  even  than 
that  which  Mr.  Stead  has  expounded  in  his  "Real 
Ghost  Stories  "  and  "  More  Ghost  Stories."  This  led 
him  to  believe  in  another  life,  and  his  fear  of  chiefs 
and  efforts  to  propitiate  them  after  they  were  dead 
evolved  the  idea  of  God.  Some  regard  for  others, 
and  some  crude  notion  of  property,  was  also  evolved 
by  fear  of  reprisal  from  others  when  he  injured  them 
or  took  their  belongings,  and  by  the  punishment  in- 
flicted by  chiefs.  Cannibalism  declined  as  the  prac- 
tice of  slaver}^  grew,  and  it  became  more  profitable 
to  work  a  captive  than  to  eat  him.  But  primi- 
tive man  was  not  only  a  cannibal,  he  was  a  trophy- 
taker,  given  to  the  practice  of  gathering  human 
heads  and  jaw  bones  as  evidences  of  his  prowess. 
This  led  to  mutilations  of  the  living,  or  self-mutila- 
tions, as  marks  of  respect  or  deference,  and  this 
again  led  to  the  giving  of  presents ;  and  this  in 
its  turn  evolved  on  the  one  side  into  political  and 
ecclesiastical  revenues,  and  on  the  other  into  a 
greater  respect  for  property,  and  a  recognition  of 
value,  and  finally  into  barter,  and  then  trade.  In 
similar  ways  all  our  perceptions,  feelings,  instincts  and 


160  llECANTATION. 

habits  have  arisen.  As  for  the  mooted  question, 
whether  we  have  innate  ideas  or  whether  all  our  ideas 
are  derived  from  experience,  the  solution  of  the  S3-n- 
thetic  Philosophy  is,  that  while  all  our  ideas  are  origi- 
nally derived  from  experience,  they  are  of  two  kinds 
—  those  which  the  experience  of  our  ancestors  has 
registered  in  our  inherited  nervous  system,  and  which 
therefore  seem  to  us  original,  or  innate,  and  those 
which  we  ourselves  derive  from  experience. 

Such,  in  brief,  is  the  scheme  of  philosophy  that 
in  the  interval  between  the  publication  of  "  Social 
Statics "  and  the  publication  of  "  Justice "  Mr. 
Spencer  has  developed ;  and  which  it  is  the  purpose 
of  the  last  book  to  apply  to  the  moral  questions  gone 
over  in  the  first. 

Of  the  inadequacy  of  such  a  philosojjhy  to  account 
for  human  progress  or  coherently  to  marshal  the  great 
facts  of  human  life  and  human  history  I  have  already 
treated  at  some  length  in  Book  X.  of  "  Progress  and 
Poverty,"  entitled,  "  The  Law  of  Human  Progress." 
But  what  we  are  now  concerned  with  is  the  question, 
Where  in  such  a  philosophy  is  a  basis  for  moral  ideas 
to  be  found? 

I  cannot  see,  nor  can  I  find  that  Mr.  Spencer  has 
been  able  to.  Though  still  continuing  to  condemn 
Bentham,  as  he  did  in  "  Social  Statics,"  all  his  efforts 
to  obtain  something  like  a  moral  sanction  reach  no 
further  than  expediency. 

And  how  can  it  be  otherwise  ?  If,  in  all  we  are  and 
think  and  feel,  we  are  but  passing  pliases  of  the 
interactions  of  matter  and  motion?  —  if  behind  the 
force  manifested  in  matter  and  motion  is  nothing  but 
the  unknowable,  and  before  us  nothing  but  dissipa- 


THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.  161 

tion  —  personal  dissipation  when  we  die,  and  the 
matter  and  motion  of  which  alone  we  are  com- 
posed seek  other  forms ;  and  then  a  death  of  the 
race,  followed  by  a  dissipation  of  the  globe  ?  —  why- 
should  we  not  eat,  drink,  and  be  merry  to  the  limit 
of  opportunity  and  digestion  ?  If  our  ideas  of  God 
and  of  a  future  life  come  merely  from  the  blunders 
of  savages  so  stupid  that  they  took  shadows  for 
other  selves  and  dreams  for  realities  ?  if  we  would 
still  be  eating  each  other  had  it  not  been  discovered 
that  man  might  use  man  more  profitably  as  a  laborer 
than  as  food  ?  if  what  we  call  the  promptings  of 
conscience  are  merely  inherited  habits,  the  results 
of  the  fear  of  punishment  transmitted  through  the 
nervous  system?  —  why  should  I  not  lie  whenever  I 
may  find  it  convenient  and  safe  to  lie?  why  should 
I  avoid  any  omission  or  commission  that  will  bring  no 
legal  or  social  or  personal  penalty  or  inconvenience  ? 
why  should  I  refrain  from  selling  my  ability,  what- 
ever it  may  be,  to  any  cause  or  interest  that  has 
power  to  give  me  what  I  desire,  whether  it  be  wealth 
or  honor  ? 

Mr.  Spencer's  philosophy  makes  no  distinction 
between  motives  and  results,  nor  does  it  admit  of  any. 
If  it  has  any  gospel,  it  is  the  gospel  of  results,  and 
the  results  that  it  treats  as  to  be  sought  are  only  re- 
sults that  make  life  pleasurable.  Temperance,  chas- 
tity, probity,  industry,  public  spirit,  generosity,  love ! 
They  have  in  this  philosophy  no  promise  and  no 
reward,  save  as  they  may  directly  or  indirectly  add  to 
the  pleasure  of  the  individual.  For  the  self-sacrifice 
of  the  hero,  the  devotion  of  the  saint,  the  steadfast- 
ness of  the  martyr ;  for  the  spirit  that  ennobles  the 


162  RECANTATION. 

annals  of  mankind,  that  has  led  and  yet  leads  so 
many  to  endure  discomfort,  want,  pain,  death,  for  the 
love  of  the  true  and  the  pure  and  the  good ;  for  the 
noble  hope  of  doing  something  to  break  the  chains  of 
the  captive,  to  open  the  eyes  of  the  blind,  to  make 
life  for  those  who  may  come  after  fuller,  nobler,  hap- 
pier ;  for  the  faith  that  has  led  men  to  dare  all  things 
and  suffer  all  things ;  it  has  no  breath  of  stimulation 
or  praise.  In  the  cold  glare  that  it  takes  for  light, 
such  men  are  fools.  For  it  knows  no  more  of  human 
will  as  a  factor  in  the  advance  of  mankind  than  it 
does  of  the  Divine  Will.  To  it  what  conditions  exist, 
and  what  conditions  will  exist,  are  determined  by  the 
irresistible  grind  of  forces  that  in  the  last  analysis 
are  resolvable  into  the  integration  of  matter  and  the 
dissipation  of  motion.  Its  fatalism  eliminates  free- 
will. Environment  and  heredity  are  everything, 
human  volition  nothing.  Carry  this  philosophy  to 
its  legitimate  conclusion,  and  the  man  is  a  mere 
automaton  who  thinks  he  is  a  free  agent  only  because 
he  does  not  feel  the  strings  that  move  him.  That  I 
am  a  man  is  because  I  have  been  evolved  from  the 
brute,  as  the  bowlder  is  rounded  from  the  rock  ;  as  the 
brute,  my  ancestor,  was  evolved  from  colloid,  and 
colloid  from  indefinite,  incoherent  homogeneous  mat- 
ter. And  that  I  am  this  or  that  kind  of  a  man,  with 
such  and  such  powers,  tastes,  habits,  ways  of  think- 
ing, feeling,  perceiving,  acting,  is  simply  the  result 
of  the  external  influences  that  registered  in  my  an- 
cestors the  nerve  impressions  transmitted  to  me,  and 
that  have  continued  to  mould  me.  Social  institu- 
tions, the  outgrowth  of  a  similar  evolution  in  which 
free-will  had  no  part,  will  continue  their  evolution 


THE    SYNTHETIC    PHILOSOPHY.  163 

without  help  or  hindrance   from  anything  which  is 
really  choice  or  volition  of  mine. 

Extremes  sometimes  curiously  meet.  The  philos- 
ophy of  Schopenhauer,  which  in  deriving  everything 
from  will  is  the  antipodes  of  the  Spencerian  philos- 
ophy, and  which,  like  the  philosophies  of  India,  of 
which  it  is  a  European  version,  holds  existence  an 
evil,  and  looks  for  relief  only  to  the  renunciation  of 
the  will  to  live,  would,  if  it  were  generally  accepted, 
produce  among  the  European  races  the  same  social 
lethargy,  the  same  hopelessness  of  reform,  the  same 
readiness  to  bow  before  any  tyrant,  that  have  so  long 
characterized  the  masses  of  India.  It  seems  to  me 
that  the  essential  fatalism  of  the  philosophy  of  Mr. 
Spencer  would  have  a  similar  result.^ 

1  In  "  Progress  and  Poverty,"  Book  X.,  Chapter  I.,  I  say: 
The  practical  outcome  of  this  theory  Is  in  a  sort  of  hopeful  fatal- 
ism, of  which  current  literature  is  full.  In  this  view,  progress  is 
the  result  of  forces  which  work  slowly,  steadily  and  remorselessly, 
for  the  elevation  of  man.  War,  slavery,  tyranny,  superstition, 
famine  and  pestilence,  the  want  and  misery  which  fester  in  mod- 
ern civilization,  are  the  impelling  causes  which  drive  man  on,  hy 
eliminating  poorer  types  and  extending  the  higher;  and  hereditary 
transmission  is  the  power  by  whicli  advances  are  fixed,  and  past 
advances  made  the  footing  for  new  advances.  The  individual  is 
the  result  of  changes  thus  impressed  upon  and  perpetuated  through 
a  long  series  of  past  individuals,  and  the  social  organization  takes 
its  form  from  the  individuals  of  which  it  is  composed.  Thus, 
while  this  tlieory  is,  as  Herbert  Spencer  says^  —  "radical  to  a 
degree  beyond  anything  which  current  radicalism  conceives;"  in- 
asmuch as  it  looks  for  changes  in  the  very  nature  of  man;  it  is  at 
the  same  time  "  conservative  to  a  degree  beyond  anytliing  con- 
ceived by  current  conservatism,"  inasnuich  as  it  holds  that  no 
change  can  avail  save  these  slow  changes  in  men's  natures.  Pliilos- 
ophers  may  teach  tiiat  this  does  not  lessen  the  duty  of  endeavoring 
to  reform  abuses,  just  as  the  theologians  who  tauglit  predestinari- 
anism  insisted  on  the  duty  of  all  to  struggle  for  salvation;  but,  as 
generally  apprehended,  the  result  is  fatalism  —  "do  wiiat  Ave  may, 
the  mills  of  the  gods  grind  on  regardless  either  of  our  aid  or  our 
hindrance."  * 

Some  years  after  this  was  written  I  had  a  curious  illustration  of 
its  truth.     Talking  one  day  with  the  late  E.  L.  Youmans,  the  great 

'  "  The  Study  of  Sociology  "  —Conclusion, 


164  KECANTATION. 

And  as  the  pessimistic  philosophy  of  the  one  seems 
to  flow  from  the  abandonment  of  action  for  mere 
speculation,  and  from  the  satiety  and  ennui  which 
under  certain  conditions  accompany  it,  so  the  evolu- 
tionary philosophy  of  the  other  seems  to  be  such  as 
might  result  from  the  abandonment  of  a  noble  pur- 
pose —  from  a  turning  from  the  thorny  path  which  an 
attack  upon  vested  wrongs  must  open,  to  embrace  the 
pleasanter  ways  of  acquiescence  in  things  as  they  are. 

It  is  not  for  me  to  say  what  is  cause  and  what 
is  effect;  but  the  correspondence  of  Mr.  Spencer's 
philosophy,  which  ignores  the  spiritual  element  and 
knows  nothing  of  duty,  with  his  own  attitude  as  shown 
in  his  letters  to  the  aS'^.  James's  Gazette  and  the  Times 
and  in  "  The  Man  versus  the  State,"  is  very  striking. 
In  "  Justice  "  we  shall  see  more  of  this  correspond- 
ence. 

pojiularizer  of  Spencerianism  in  the  United  States,  a  man  of  warni 
and  generous  sympathies,  whose  philosopliy  seemed  to  me  Uke  an 
ill-fitting  coat  he  had  accidentally  picked  up  and  put  on,  he  fell  into 
speaking  -n  ith  much  warmth  of  the  political  corruption  of  New 
York,  of  the  utter  carelessness  and  selfishness  of  the  rich,  and 
of  their  readiness  to  submit  to  it,  or  to  promote  it  wherever  it 
served  their  money-getting  purposes  to  do  so.  He  became  so  indig- 
nant as  he  went  on  that  he  raised  his  voice  till  he  almost  shouted. 

Alluding  to  a  conversation  some  time  before,  in  which  I  had 
affirmed  and  he  had  denied  the  duty  of  taking  part  in  politics,  I 
said  to  him,  "  What  do  you  propose  to  do  about  it  ?  " 

Of  a  sudden  his  manner  and  tone  were  completely  changed,  as 
remembering  his  Spencerianism,  he  threw  himself  back,  and  re- 
plied, with  something  like  a  sigh,  "  Xothing!  You  and  I  can  do 
nothing  at  all.  It's  all  a  matter  of  evolution.  \Ye  can  only  wait 
for  evolution.  Perhaps  in  four  or  five  thousand  years  evolution 
may  have  carfied  men  beyond  this  state  of  things.  But  we  can  do 
nothing." 


CHAPTER   IV. 

THE  IDEA  OF  JUSTICE   IN    THE    SYNTHETIC 
PHILOSOPHY, 

As  the  culminating  development  of  his  evolution- 
ary or  synthetic  philosophy,  ]\Ir.  Spencer  now  comes 
to  treat  of  those  social-economic  questions  that  in- 
volve the  idea  of  justice,  in  a  liook  which  he  entitles 
"  Justice." 

But  what  is  justice  ? 

It  is  the  rendering  to  each  his  due.  It  pre-supposes 
a  moral  law,  and  its  corollaries,  natural  rights  which 
are  self-evident.  But  where  in  a  philosophy  that 
denies  spirit,  that  ignores  will,  that  derives  all  the 
qualities  and  attributes  of  man  from  the  integration 
of  matter  and  the  dissipation  of  motion,  can  we  find 
any  basis  for  the  idea  of  justice  ? 

"  Justice,"  says  Montesquieu,  "  is  a  relation  of  con- 
gruity  which  really  subsists  between  two  things.  This 
relation  is  always  the  same,  Avhatever  being  considers 
it,  whether  it  be  God,  or  an  angel,  or  lastly  a  man." 
This,  too,  in  "  Social  Statics,"  Avas  Mr.  Spencer's  con- 
ception. Justice  he  tells  us  there  means  equalness  — 
that  is  to  say,  a  relation  of  congruity  or  equality  which 
is  always  the  same,  and  always  apprehensible  by  men, 
no  matter  what  be  their  condition  of  development  or 
degree  of  knowledge.  As  the  basis  of  all  his  reasoning 
he  postulates  an  inherent  moral  sense,  which  "none 
but  those  committed  to  a  preconceived  theory  can  fail 


166  RECANTATION. 

to  recognize  "  —  a  perception  that  bears  to  morality  the 
same  relationship  that  the  perception  of  the  primary 
laws  of  quantity  bear  to  mathematics ;  and  which 
enables  us  to  recognize  an  "eternal  law  of  things,"  a 
"Divine  order,"  in  which,  and  not  in  any  notions  of 
what  is  expedient  either  for  the  individual  or  for  all 
individuals,  we  may  find  a  sure  guide  of  conduct,  the 
apprehension  of  right  and  wrong.  And  tliis  it  seems 
to  me  is  necessarily  and  universally  involved  in  the 
idea  of  justice,  so  that  when  a  man,  whatever  be  his 
theories,  thinks  of  right  or  wrong,  just  or  unjust,  he 
thinks  of  a  relation,  like  that  of  odd  and  even,  or 
more  and  less,  which  is  always  and  everywhere  to  be 
seen  by  whoever  will  look. 

But  this  self-evidence  of  natural  rights  the  Syn- 
thetic Philosophy  denies.  It  admits  the  existence  of 
natural  rights  — that  is  to  say,  rights  which  pertain  to 
the  individual  man  as  man,  and  are  consequently 
equal;  but  it  derives  the  genesis  of  these  rights,  or 
at  least  their  apprehension  by  man,  from  this  process 
of  his  gradual  evolution,  by  virtue  of  which  they 
evolve,  or  he  becomes  conscious  of  them,  after  a  cer- 
tain amount  of  "  social  discipline,"  and  not  before.  If 
such  rights  exist  before,  it  must  be  potentially,  or  in 
some  such  way  as  the  Platonic  ideas.  But  as  this 
would  involve  an  appointed  order ;  and  hence  intelli- 
gent will,  to  which  we  must  attribute  equity ;  and 
hence  God ;  it  seems  inconsistent  with  Mr.  Spencer's 
present  view  —  not  necessarily  with  that  part  which 
derives  our  physical  constitutions  from  lower  animals 
and  primarily  from  the  integrations  of  matter  and 
motion  —  for  this  is  a  mere  matter  of  external  form, 
and  that  our  bodies  come,  somehow,  "  from  the  dust 


JUSTICE   IN   THE   SYNTHETIC    PHILOSOPHY.      167 

of  the  earth "  as  the  Scriptures  put  it,  is  as  clear 
as  that  ice  comes  from  water  —  but  with  that  part 
which  gives  to  the  ego  the  same  genesis,  and  accounts 
for  our  mental  and  moral  qualities  by  variation, 
survival  of  the  fittest,  the  pressure  of  conditions, 
social  discipline  and  heredity  of  acquired  character- 
istics. 

Mr.  Spencer  realizes  this  inconsistency,  for,  aban- 
doning altogether  his  original  derivation  and  expla- 
nation of  justice,  he  proceeds  in  "  Justice  "  to  make 
another  derivation  and  explanation  in  accordance 
with  his  new  philosophy,  devoting  to  this  the  first 
eight  chapters,  or  something  more  than  a  fifth  of  the 
book.  With  its  validity  or  invalidity,  its  coherency 
or  incoherency,  I  am  not  here  concerned ;  my  object 
being  merely  to  show  how  he  arrives  at  the  concep- 
tion of  justice  and  what  it  is,  so  that  we  may  judge 
the  teachings  of  "  Justice  "  from  its  own  avowed 
standpoint. 

To  present  Mr.  Spencer's  argument  as  intelligibly 
as  I  can,  I  will  make  a  synopsis  of  the  first  eight 
chapters  of  "  Justice,"  as  far  as  possible  in  his  own 
words,  but  without  quotation  marks,  employing 
smaller  type  where  the  exact  words  can  be  used  at 
some  length. 

These  chapters  are  — 

1.  —  Animal  Ethics. 

During  immaturity,  benefits  received  must  be  in- 
versely proportioned  to  capacities  possessed.  After 
maturity,  benefits  must  vary  directly  as  worth,  meas- 
ured by  fitness  for  the  conditions  of  existence.  The 
ill-fitted  must  suffer  the  evils  of  unfitness,  and  the 
well-fitted  prove  their  fitness. 


168  RECANTATION. 

2.  —  Suh~Human  Justice. 

The  law  of  sub-liuman  justice  is  that  each  individ- 
ual sliall  receive  the  benefits  and  the  evils  of  its  own 
nature  and  its  consequent  conduct. 

3.  —  Human  Justice. 

Each  individual  ought  to  receive  the  benefits  and 
the  evils  of  his  own  nature  and  consequent  conduct, 
neither  being  prevented  from  having  whatever  good  his 
actions  normally  bring  him,  nor  allowed  to  shoulder 
off  this  evil  on  other  persons. 

4.  —  TJie  Sentiment  of  Justice. 

Our  feeling  that  we  ourselves  ought  to  have  free- 
dom to  receive  the  results  of  our  own  nature  and  con- 
sequent actions,  and  which  prompts  maintenance  of 
the  sphere  for  this  free  play,  results  from  inheritances 
of  modifications  produced  by  habit,  or  from  more 
numerous  survivals  of  individuals  having  nervous 
structures  wliich  have  varied  in  fit  ways,  and  from 
the  tendency  of  groups  formed  of  members  having 
this  adaptation  to  survive  and  spread.  Recognition 
of  the  similar  freedom  of  others  is  evolved  from  the 
fear  of  retaliation,  from  the  punishment  of  inter- 
ference prompted  by  the  interests  of  the  chief,  from 
fear  of  the  dead  chief's  ghost,  and  from  fear  of  God, 
when  dead-chief-ghost  worship  grows  into  God  wor- 
ship, and,  finally,  by  the  sympathy  evolved  by  grega- 
riousness. 

5.  —  The  Idea  of  Justice. 

It  emerges  and  becomes  definite  from  experiences, 
generation  after  generation,  which  provoke  resent- 
ment and  reactive  pains,  until  finally  there  arises  a 
conception  of  a  limit  to  each  kind  of  activity  up  to 
which  there  is  freedom  to  act.  But  it  is  a  long  time 
before  the  general  nature  of  the  limit  common  to  all 
cases  can  be  conceived.     On  the  one  hand  there  is 


JUSTICE   IN   THE   SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.      169 

tlie  positive  element,  implied  by  each  man's  recog- 
nition of  his  claims  to  unimjjeded  activities  and 
the  benefits  they  bring ;  on  the  other  hand  there  is 
the  negative  element  implied  by  the  consciousness  of 
limits  which  the  presence  of  other  men  having  like 
claims  necessitates.  Inequality  is  suggested  by  the 
one,  for  if  each  is  to  receive  the  benefits  due  his  own 
nature  and  consequent  conduct,  then,  since  men  dif- 
fer in  their  powers,  there  must  be  differences  in  the 
results.  Equality  is  suggested  by  the  other,  since 
bounds  must  be  set  to  the  doings  of  each  to  avoid 
quarrels,  and  experience  shows  that  these  bounds  are 
on  the  average  the  same  for  all.  Unbalanced  appre- 
ciation of  the  one  is  fostered  by  war,  and  tends  to 
social  organization  of  the  militant  type,  where  in- 
equality is  established  by  authority,  an  inequality 
referring,  not  to  the  natural  achievement  of  greater 
rewards  by  greater  merits,  but  to  the  artificial  appor- 
tionment of  greater  rewards  to  greater  merits.  Un- 
balanced appreciation  of  the  other  tends  to  such 
theories  as  Bentham's  greatest  happiness  principle, 
and  to  communism  and  socialism.  The  true  concep- 
tion is  to  be  obtained  by  noting  that  the  equality 
concerns  the  mutually  limited  spheres  of  action  which 
must  be  maintained  if  associated  men  are  to  co-oper- 
ate harmoniously,  while  the  inequality  concerns  the 
results  which  each  may  achieve  by  carrying  on  his 
actions  within  the  implied  limits.  The  two  may  be 
and  must  be  simultaneously  asserted. 

6.  —  The  Formula  of  Justice. 

It  must  be  positive  in  so  far  as  it  asserts  for  each 
that,  since  he  is  to  receive  and  suffer  the  good  and 
evil  of  his  own  actions,  he  must  be  allowed  to  act. 
And  it  must  be  negative  in  so  far  as,  by  asserting  this 
of  every  one,  it  implies  that  each  can  be  allowed  to 
act  only  under  tlie  restraint  imposed  by  the  presence 
of  others  having  like  claims  to  act.  Evidently,  the 
positive  element  is    that  which  expresses   a   prereq- 


170  RECANTATION. 

uisite  to  life  in  general,  and  the  negative  element  is 
that  which  qualifies  this  prerequisite  in  the  way 
required,  when,  instead  of  one  life  carried  on  alone, 
there  are  many  lives  carried  on  together. 

Hence,  that  which  we  have  to  express  in  a  precise 
way  is  the  liberty  of  each  limited  only  by  the  like 
liberties  of  all.  This  Ave  do  by  saying,  Every  man 
is  free  to  do  what  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes  not 
the  equal  freedom  of  any  other  man. 

7.  —  The  Authority  of  this  Foynnula. 

The  reigning  school  of  politics  and  morals  has  a 
contempt  for  doctrines  that  imply  restraint  on  the 
doings  of  immediate  expediency.  But  if  causation 
be  universal,  it  must  hold  throughout  the  actions  of 
incorporated  men.  Evolution  implies  that  a  distinct 
conception  of  justice  can  have  arisen  but  gradually. 
It  has  gone  on  more  rapidly  under  peaceful  relations, 
and  been  held  back  by  war.  Nevertheless,  where  the 
conditions  have  allowed,  it  has  evolved  slowly  to 
some  extent,  and  formed  for  itself  approximately  true 
expressions,  as  shown  in  the  Hebrew  Commandments, 
and  without  distinction  between  generosity  and  jus- 
tice, in  the  Christian  Golden  Kule,  and  in  modern 
forms  in  the  rule  of  Kant.  It  is  also  shown  on  the 
legal  side,  in  the  maxims  of  lawyers  as  to  natural 
law,  admitted  inferentially  even  by  the  despotically- 
minded  Austin. 

These,  it  will  be  objected,  are  a  priori  beliefs.  The 
doctrine  of  evolution  teaches  that  a  priori  beliefs 
entertained  by  men  at  large  must  have  arisen,  if  not 
from  the  experiences  of  each  individual,  then  from 
the  experiences  of  the  race.  Fixed  intuitions  must 
have  been  established  by  that  intercourse  with  things 
which  tliroughout  an  enormous  past  has  directly  and 
indirectly  determined  the  organization  of  the  nervous 
system,  and  certain  resulting  necessities  of  thought. 
Thus  had  the  law  of  equal  freedom  no  other  than 
a  priori  derivations,  it  would  still  be  rational  to  re- 


JUSTICE   IN   THE    SYNTHETIC   PHILOSOPHY.       171 

gard  it  as  an  adumbration  of  a  truth,  if  not  still 
literally  true.  And  the  inductive  school,  including 
Bentham  and  Mill  are,  on  analysis,  driven  to  the  basis 
of  a  priori  cognitions. 

But  the  principle  of  natural  equity,  expressed  in 
the  freedom  of  each,  limited  only  by  the  like  freedom 
of  all,  is  not  exclusively  an  a  priori  belief. 

Examination  of  the  facts  has  sliowu  it  to  be  a  funda- 
mental law,  by  conformity  to  which  life  has  evolved 
from  its  lowest  up  to  its  highest  forms,  that  each  adult 
individual  shall  take  the  consequences  of  its  own  nature 
and  actions :  survival  of  the  fittest  being  the  result. 
And  the  necessary  implication  is  an  assertion  of  that 
full  liberty  to  act  which  forms  the  positive  element  in 
the  formula  of  justice  ;  since,  without  full  liberty  to  act, 
the  relation  between  conduct  and  consequence  cannot 
be  maintained.  Various  examples  have  made  clear  the 
conclusion  manifest  in  theory,  that  among  gregarious 
creatures  this  freedom  of  each  to  act  has  to  be  restricted ; 
since  if  it  is  unrestricted  there  must  arise  such  clashing 
of  actions  as  prevents  the  gregariousness.  And  the  fact 
that,  relatively  unintelligent  though  they  are,  inferior 
gregarious  creatures  inflict  penalties  for  breaches  of  the 
needful  restrictions,  shows  how  regard  for  them  has 
come  to  be  unconsciously  established  as  a  condition  to 
persistent  social  life. 

These  two  laws,  holding,  the  one  of  all  creatures  and 
the  other  of  social  creatures,  and  the  display  of  which  is 
clearer  in  proportion  as  the  evolution  is  higlier,  find  their 
last  and  fullest  sphere  of  manifestation  in  liuman  socie- 
ties. We  have  recently  seen  that  along  with  the  growth 
of  peaceful  co-operation  there  has  been  an  increasing 
conformity  to  this  compound  law  under  both  its  positive 
and  negative  aspects  ;  and  we  have  also  seen  that  there 
has  gone  on  simultaneously  an  increase  of  emotional 
regard  for  it,  and  intellectual  apprehension  of  it. 

So  that  we  have  not  only  the  reasons  above  given  for 
concluding  that  tliis  a  j)r{ori  belief  has  its  origin  in  the 
experiences  of  the  race,  but  we  are  enabled  to  afiiliate 
it  on  the  experiences  of  living  creatures  at  large,  and  to 
perceive  that  it  is  but  a  conscious  response  to  certain 
necessary  relations  in  tlie  order  of  nature. 


172  RECANTATION. 

No  higher  warrant  can  be  imagined ;  and  now,  accept- 
ing the  law  of  equal  freedom  as  an  ultimate  ethical 
principle,  having  an  authority  transcending  every  other, 
we  may  proceed  with  our  inquiry. 

8.  —  Its  Corollaries. 

That  the  general  formula  of  justice  may  serve  for 
guidance,  deductions  must  be  drawn  severally  appli- 
cable to  special  classes  of  cases.  The  several  par- 
ticular freedoms  deducible  from  the  laws  of  equal 
freedom  may  fitly  be  called,  as  they  commonly  are 
called,  rights.  Rights  truly  so  called  are  corollaries 
from  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  and  what  are  falsely 
called  rights  are  not  deducible  from  it. 

It  is  not  worth  while  to  examine  this  argument. 
It  is  sufficient  for  our  purpose  to  see  that  in  "  Justice  " 
Mr.  Spencer  re-asserts  the  same  principle  from  which 
in  "  Social  Statics  "  he  condemned  private  property 
in  land. 


CHAPTER  V. 

MR.    spencer's    task. 

The  first  eight  chapters  of  "  Justice,"  as  we  have 
seen,  bring  Mr.  Spencer  by  a  diiferent  route  to  the 
same  "  first  principle  "  which  he  had  laid  down  forty 
years  before  in  "  Social  Statics,"  and  from  which  he 
had  deduced  the  equal  right  of  all  men  to  the  use 
of  land  and  the  ethical  invalidity  of  private  property 
in  land  —  "all  deeds,  customs,  and  laws  notwith- 
standing." 

We  are  not  concerned  now  with  "  Social  Statics." 
We  are  not  concerned  with  any  of  Mr.  Spencer  s 
changes  in  opinion,  teleological,  metaphysical,  or  of 
any  other  kind.  We  have  here  merely  the  Synthetic 
philosopher,  who  from  grounds  based  on  the  doctiine 
of  evolution  lays  down  as  the  fundamental  formula 
of  justice,  the  axiomatic  principle  from  which  all  the 
rights  of  men  in  their  relations  with  each  other  are 
to  be  deduced :  that  all  men  have  freedom  to  do  as 
they  will,  provided  they  infringe  not  the  equal  freedom 
of  all  others.^     What  follows,  with  regard  to  tlie  use 

1  From  Appendix  A  of  "  Justice,"  it  seems  that  Mr.  Spencer 
has  hitherto  supposed  that  his  statement  of  this  "  first  principle  "  of 
"Social  Statics."  was  the  first  time  it  had  been  thus  put.  In  1883 
Professor  Maitland  had,  however,  pointed  out  that  '"  Kant  had 
already  enunciated  in  other  words  a  similar  doctrine."  Mr.  Spencer 
tells  us  that,  "  Not  being  able  to  read  the  German  quotation  given 
by  Mr.  Maitland,"  he  was  unable  to  test  the  statement  until,  in  the 


174  RECANTATION. 

of  land,  from  this  fundamental  principle  of  the  evolu- 
tionary philosophy  ?  Is  it  not,  unavoidably  and  irre- 
sistibly what  Mr.  Spencer  stated  years  before  ?  — 

Given  a  race  of  human  beings  having  like  claims  to 
pursue  the  objects  of  their  desires  —  given  a  world 
adapted  to  the  gratification  of  those  desires  —  a  world 
into  which  such  beings  are  similarly  born,  and  it  una- 
voidably follows  that  they  have  equal  rights  to  the  use 
of  this  world.  For  if  each  of  them  "  has  freedom  to  do 
all  that  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal 
freedom  of  any  other,"  then  each  of  them  is  free  to  use 
the  earth  for  the  satisfaction  of  his  wants,  provided  he 
allows  all  others  the  same  liberty.  And  conversely,  it 
is  manifest  that  no  one,  or  part  of  them,  may  use  the 
earth  in  such  a  way  as  to  prevent  the  rest  from  similarly 
using  it;  seeing  that  to  do  this  is  to  assume  greater 
freedom  than  the  rest,  and  consequently  to  break  the 
law. 

Is  there  one  single  deduction  in  Chapter  IX.  of 
"Social  Statics  "  that  does  not  as  clearly  follow  frofn 
this  reasoning  of  "  Justice  "  —  one  single  word  that 
requires  alteration  to  fit  it  for  a  place  in  the  deduc- 
tions to  be  drawn  from  this  formula,  except  the 
single  word  God?     And  the  substitution   of    "The 

preparation  of  "  Justice,"  he  reached  Chapter  VI.,  when  he  discov- 
ered in  a  recent  English  translation  of  Kant  certain  passages  which 
he  gives,  that  "make  it  clear  that  Kant  had  arrived  at  a  conclu- 
sion, which,  if  not  the  same  as  my  own,  is  closely  allied  to  it." 

I  mention  this  as  showing  the  importance  Mr.  Spencer  yet 
attaches  to  the  "  first  principle,"  from  which  he  deduced  the  con- 
demnation of  private  property  in  land.  Otherwise  the  matter  is 
of  no  interest.  His  statement  of  this  principle  or  formula  was 
a  good  one,  and  doubtless  original  with  him.  Who  had  stated  it 
before  made  no  more  difference  than  who  first  stated  that  one  and 
one  equal  two.  There  are  some  things  whicli  to  the  human  mind 
are  self-evident  —  that  is  to  say,  which  may  be  seen  by  whoever 
chooses  to  look  —  and  this  is  one  of  them. 


MR.  spencer's  task.  175 

Unknowable  "  or  "  Evolution  "  for  "  God  "  would  in  no 
wise  alter  or  lessen  the  force  of  the  reasoning. 

How,  then,  shall  Mr.  Spencer  justify  private  prop- 
erty in  land,  which  in  his  letters  to  the  Times  he  had 
bound  himself  to  do?  How  shall  he  deduce  the 
rights  of  land-owners  to  compensation  for  their  land 
or  in  any  way  assert  for  them  rights  that  will  lessen 
or  modify,  or  in  any  way  condition,  the  equal  right  of 
all  their  fellows  to  the  use  of  land  ? 

To  men  like  Professor  Huxley  there  is  a  short 
and  easy  way  of  doing  this.  It  is  simply  to  deny  the 
existence  of  natural  rights  ;  that  is  to  say,  rights 
having  any  higher  or  more  permanent  sanction  than 
municiijal  regulation.  To  be  sure  this  opens  a  most 
awkward  dilemma,  for  if  power,  or  if  j^ou  please 
legislative  enactment,  be  the  only  sanction  of  right, 
what  remains  for  the  House  of  Have,  when  the  House 
of  Want  shall  muster  its  more  numerous  forces,  either 
on  the  field  of  brute  strength  or  in  legislatures  already 
controlled  by  popular  suffrage  ?  But,  "  after  us,  the 
deluge  I "  and  such  considerations  do  not  much  trouble 
those  who  take  this  short  and  easy  way.  Mr.  Spencer, 
however,  is  debarred  from  taking  it ;  not  by  what  he 
has  before  said  on  the  land  question,  for  that  could 
be  unsaid,  but  by  his  philosoph}^  If  there  is  no  right 
but  might,  what  does  that  philosophy  mean  and  what 
is  it  for?  If  there  is  no  law  but  that  of  the  state, 
why  does  he  write  books  to  tell  us  what  the  state 
ought  and  ought  not  to  do?  And,  furthermore,  he 
has  just  deduced  as  his  formula  of  justice,  having, 
he  says,  the  highest  imaginable  warrant  —  the  same 
first  principle  from  which  in  "  Social  Statics "  he 
deduced  the  invalidity  of  private  property  in  land. 


176  RECANTATION. 

The  short  and  easy  way  of  justifying  private  prop- 
erty in  land,  because  it  exists,  or  because  it  is  sanc- 
tioned by  the  state,  is  therefore  not  open  to  Mr. 
Spencer,  unless  he  is  read}^  to  abandon  the  last  shred 
and  figment  of  philosophic  claim.  His  is  a  more 
difficult  task.  What  he  has  to  do,  is  to  prove  that 
the  disinheritance  of  nineteen-twentieths  of  his  coun- 
trymen accords  with  his  "ultimate  ethical  principle 
having  an  authority  transcending  every  other  "  —  his 
formula  of  justice,  that  "Every  man  is  free  to  do  that 
which  he  will,  provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal 
freedom  of  any  other  man."  To  show  that  the  so-called 
rights  of  existing  land-owners  to  monopolize  the  land 
on  which  all  must  live  are  real  rights,  he  must,  on 
his  own  statement,  show  that  they  are  deducible  from 
the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

Knowing,  then,  from  Mr.  Spencer's  more  recent 
utterances  that  he  is  determined  at  any  cost  to  get 
on  the  comfortable  side  of  the  land  question,  we  may 
be  certain  in  advance  that  "  Justice  "  will  afford  a 
spectacle  both  interesting  and  instructive.  Interest- 
ing as  the  effort  of  a  man  of  ability  to  accomplish  a 
feat  of  intellectual  legerdemain  equivalent,  not  to 
swallowing  a  sword,  but  to  swallowing  himself. 
Instructive  as  showing  how  far  a  man  so  able  that 
many  people  think  him  the  greatest  philosopher  that 
has  ever  yet  appeared ;  a  man  who  has  the  advantage 
of  knowing  what  can  be  said  on  the  other  side,  can, 
on  grounds  which  admit  the  equal  right  of  men  to  be 
in  the  world,  succeed  in  justifying  that  existing  social 
arrangement  which  gives  to  a  few  the  exclusive  owner- 
ship of*  the  world,  and  denies  to  the  many  any  right 
to  its  use,  save  as  they  purchase  the  privilege  of 
these  few  world-owners. 


MR.  spencer's  task.  177 

A  Lord  Bramwell  or  a  Professor  Huxley  or  a 
Duke  of  Argyll  Avould  rush  in  boldly  and  proceed 
frankly.  But  Mr.  Spencer  knows  that  to  accomplish 
his  task  the  attention  of  the  reader  must  be  confused 
and  the  real  issue  avoided.  The  effort  to  do  tliis 
is  to  be  seen  at  a  glance  the  moment  we  come  to 
the  vital  part  of  ''  Justice." 

In  "  Social  Statics "  the  discussion  of  "  The 
Rights  of  Life  and  Personal  Liberty  "  occupies  hardly  t 
more  than  a  single  page,  being  treated  as  "  such  self- 
evident  corollaries  from  our  first  principle  as  hardly 
to  need  a  separate  statement."  In  "  Justice  "  it  is 
padded  out  into  two  chapters  —  "  The  Right  to  Per- 
sonal Integrity  "  and  "  The  Rights  to  Free  Motion 
and  Locomotion,"  which,  by  references  to  the  Fijians, 
the  Wends,  the  Herculeans,  the  Homeric  Greeks,  and 
so  on,  are  made  to  occupy  some  twelve  or  thirteen 
times  as  much  space.  But,  although  Mr.  Spencer 
also  refers  to  the  Abors,  the  Nagas,  the  Lepchas,  the 
Jakuns,  and  other  far-off  people,  he  takes  no  notice 
of  such  infractions  of  the  right  of  free  motion  and 
locomotion  by  land-owning  dukes  as  in  1850  excited 
his  indignation. 

In  place  of  the  chapter  on  "  The  Right  to  the  Use 
of  the  Earth,"  which  stands  out  so  clearly  and  so 
prominently  in  "Social  Statics,"  we  find  in  "Justice" 
a  chapter  on  "  The  Rights  to  the  Uses  of  Natural 
Media,"  of  which  only  a  part  is  devoted  to  the  right 
to  the  use  of  land,  though  a  short  note,  having  some- 
thing of  the  same  relation  to  it  that  the  traditional 
lady's  postscript  has  to  her  letter,  is  inserted  in  the 
Appendix. 

This  treatment  of  land,  or  the  surface  of  the  earth, 


178  RECANTATION. 

as  but  one  of  the  natural  media  is  in  the  highest 
degree  uiipliilosophic,  and  could  only  be  adopted  for 
the  purpose  of  confusion.  For  so  far  as  man  is  con- 
cerned all  natural  media  are  appurtenant  to  laud  ;  and 
the  term  land  in  political  economy  and  law  comprises 
all  natural  substances  and  powers.  To  treat  land 
as  o]ie  of  such  natural  media  as  light  and  air  is 
therefore  as  unphilosophic  as  it  would  be  to  treat  it 
as  one  of  such  sub-divisions  of  itself  as  water,  rock, 
gravel  or  sand.  The  clearest  and  only  philosophic 
terminology  is  that  adopted  in  "  Social  Statics  "  —  the 
right  to  the  use  of  the  eartli,  or  the  right  to  the  use 
of  land.  For  the  right  to  the  use  of  all  natural  ele- 
ments comes  from  and  with,  and  is  inseparably  in- 
volved in  and  annexed  to,  the  right  to  the  use  of 
land. 

Mr.  Spencer's  reasons  for  thus  treating  land  as 
but  one  of  the  natural  media  a})pear  as  we  read.  Not 
merely  is  the  burning  question  thus  minimized  and 
confused,  but  it  becomes  easier  by  means  of  analogy 
to  slide  over  the  injustice  of  the  present  treatment  of 
land  —  an  injustice  which,  as  Mr.  Spencer  had 
himself  previously  seen,  is  inferior  only  to  murder  or 
slavery  —  and  to  bring  private  property  in  land  into 
the  category  of  things  with  which  we  need  not  con- 
cern ourselves. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

"THE   EIGHTS   TO   THE   USES   OF  NATURAL   MEDIA.'' 

Here  in  full  is  Chapter  XI.  of  "  Justice  " : 

CHAPTER    XI. THE    RIGHTS    TO    THE    USES     OF     NATURAL 

MEDIA. 

§  49.  A  man  may  be  entirely  uninjured  in  body  by 
the  actions  of  fellow-men,  and  lie  may  be  entirely  uliim- 
peded  in  his  movements  by  them,  and  he  may  yet  be 
prevented  from  carrying  on  the  activities  needful  for 
maintenance  of  life,  by  traversing  his  relations  to  the 
physical  environment  on  which  his  life  depends.  It  is, 
indeed,  alleged  that  certain  of  these  natural  agencies 
cannot  be  removed  from  the  state  of  common  possession. 
Thus  we  read  : 

"  Some  things  are  by  nature  itself  incapable  of  appropriation, 
so  that  they  cannot  be  brought  under  the  power  of  any  one.  These 
got  the  name  of  res  communes  by  the  Roman  law;  and  were 
defined,  things  the  property  of  which  belongs  to  no  person,  but 
the  use  to  all.  Thus,  the  light,  the  air,  running  water,  etc.,  are  so 
adapted  to  the  common  use  of  mankind,  that  no  individual  can 
acquire  a  j)roperty  in  them,  or  deprive  others  of  their  use."  {An 
Institute  of  the  Law  of  Scotland  by  John  Erskine  (ed.  Macallan), 
i.,  196). 

But  tliough  light  and  air  cannot  be  monopolized,  the 
distribution  of  them  may  be  interfered  with  by  one  man 
to  the  partial  deprivation  of  another  man  —  may  be  so 
interfered  with  as  to  inflict  serious  injury  upon  him. 

No  interference  of  this  kind  is  possible  without  a 
breach  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom.  The  habitual  in- 
terception of  light  by  one  person  in  such  way  that  an- 
other person  is  habitually  deprived  of  an  equal  share, 
implies  disregard  of   the  principle  that  the    liberty  of 


180  RECANTATION. 

each  is  limited  by  the  like  liberties  of  all ;  and  the  like 
is  true  if  free  access  to  air  is  prevented. 

Under  the  same  general  head  there  must,  however,  by 
an  unusual  extension  of  meaning,  be  here  included  some- 
thing which  admits  of  appropriation  —  the  surface  of  the 
Earth.  This,  as  forming  part  of  the  physical  environ- 
ment, seems  necessarily  to  be  included  among  the  media 
of  which  the  use  may  be  claimed  under  the  law  of  equal 
freedom.  The  Earth's  surface  cannot  be  denied  to  any 
one  absolutely,  without  rendering  life-sustaining  activi- 
ties impracticable.  In  the  absence  of  standing-ground 
he  can  do  nothing  ;  and  hence  it  appears  to  be  a  corollary 
from  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  interpreted  with  strict- 
ness, that  the  Earth's  surface  may  not  be  appropriated 
absolutely  by  individuals,  but  may  be  occupied  by  them 
only  in  such  manner  as  recognizes  ultimate  ownership 
by  other  men  ;  that  is  —  by  society  at  large. 

Concerning  the  ethical  and  legal  recognitions  of  these 
claims  to  the  uses  of  media,  not  very  much  has  to  be 
said  :  only  the  last  demands  much  attention.  We  will 
look  at  each  of  them  in  succession. 

§  50.  In  the  earliest  stages,  while  yet  urban  life  had 
not  commenced,  no  serious  obstruction  of  one  man's  light 
by  another  man  could  well  take  place.  In  encampments 
of  savages,  and  in  the  villages  of  agricultural  tribes,  no 
one  was  led,  in  pursuit  of  his  ends,  to  overshadow  the 
habitation  of  his  neighbor.  Indeed,  the  structures  and 
relative  positions  of  habitations  made  such  aggressions 
almost  impracticable. 

In  later  times,  Avhen  towns  had  grown  up,  it  was  un- 
likely that  much  respect  would  forthwith  be  paid  by 
men  to  the  claims  of  their  neighbors  in  respect  of  light. 
During  stages  of  social  evolution  in  Avhich  the  rights  to 
life  and  liberty  were  little  regarded,  such  comparatively 
trivial  trespasses  as  were  committed  by  those  who  built 
liouses  close  in  front  of  others'  houses,  were  not  likely 
to  attract  much  notice,  considered  either  as  moral  trans- 
gressions or  legal  wrongs.  The  narrow,  dark  streets  of 
ancient  continental  cities,  in  common  with  the  courts  and 
alleys  characterizing  the  older  parts  of  our  own  towns, 
imply  that  in  the  days  when  they  were  built  the  shutting 
out  by  one  man  of  another  man's  share  of  sun  and  sky 


"KIUHTS  TO  THK  USES  OF  NATUKAL  MEDIA."       181 

was  not  thought  an  offence.  And,  indeed,  it  may  reason- 
ably be  held  that  recognition  of  such  an  offence  was  in 
those  days  impracticable  ;  since,  in  walled  towns,  the 
crowding  of  houses  became  a  necessity. 

In  modern  times,  however,  there  h;is  arisen  the  per- 
ception that  the  natural  distribution  of  light  may  not  be 
interfered  with.  Though  the  law  which  forbids  the 
building  of  walls,  houses,  or  other  edifices  of  certain 
heights,  within  prescribed  distances  from  existing  houses, 
does  not  absolutely  negative  the  intercepting  of  light; 
yet  it  negatives  the  intercepting  of  it  to  serious  degrees, 
and  seeks  to  compromise  the  claims  of  adjacent  owners 
as  fairly  as  seems  practicable. 

That  is  to  say,  this  corollary  from  the  law  of  equal 
freedom,  if  it  has  not  come  to  be  overtly  asserted,  has 
come  to  be  tacitly  recognized. 

§  51.  To  some  extent  interference  with  the  supply  of 
light  involves  interference  with  the  supply  of  air ;  and, 
by  interdicting  the  one,  some  interdict  is,  by  implication, 
placed  on  the  other.  But  the  claim  to  use  of  the  air, 
though  it  has  been  recognized  by  English  law  in  the 
case  of  windmills,  is  less  definitely  established  :  prob- 
ably because  only  small  evils  have  been  caused  by  ob- 
structions. 

There  has,  however,  risen  into  definite  recognition  the 
claim  to  unpolluted  air.  Though  acts  of  one  man  which 
may  diminish  the  supply  of  air  to  another  man,  have 
not  come  to  be  distinctly  classed  as  wrong  ;  yet  acts 
which  vitiate  the  quality  of  his  air  are  in  modern  times 
regarded  as  offences — offences  for  which  there  are  in 
some  cases  moral  reprobations  only,  and  in  other  cases 
legal  penalties.  In  some  measure  all  are  severally 
obliged,  by  their  own  respiration,  to  vitiate  the  air  re- 
spired by  others,  where  they  are  in  proximity.  It  needs 
but  to  walk  a  little  distance  behind  one  who  is  smoking, 
to  perceive  how  widely  diffused  are  the  exhalations  from 
each  ])ersou's  lungs  ;  and  to  what  an  extent,  therefore, 
those  wlio  are  adjacent,  especially  indoors,  are  compelled 
to  breath  the  air  that  has  already  been  taken  in  and  sent 
out  time  after  time.  lUit  since  this  vitiation  of  air  is 
mutual,  it  cannot  constitute  aggression.  Aggression 
occurs  only  when   vitiation  by  one,  or  some,  has  to  be 


182  RECANTATION. 

borne  by  others  who  do  not  take  like  shares  in  the  vitia- 
tion ;  as  often  happens  in  railway-carriages,  where  men 
who  think  themselves  gentlemen  smoke  in  other  places 
tlian  those  provided  for  smokers  :  perhaps  getting  from 
fellow-passengers  a  nominal,  though  not  a  real,  consent, 
and  careless  of  the  permanent  nuisance  entailed  on  those 
who  afterwards  travel  in  compartments  reeking  with 
stale  tobacco-smoke.  Beyond  the  recognition  of  this  by 
right-thinking  persons  as  morally  improper,  it  is  for- 
bidden as  improp<'rby  railway-regulations  ;  and,  in  virtue 
of  by-laws,  may  bring  punishment  by  fine. 

Passing  from  instances  of  this  kind  to  instances  of 
a  graver  kind,  we  have  to  note  the  interdicts  against 
various  nuisances  —  stenches  resulting  from  certain 
businesses  carried  on  near  at  hand,  injurious  fumes  such 
as  those  from  chemical  works,  and  smoke  proceeding 
from  large  chimneys.  Legislation  which  forbids  the  acts 
causing  such  nuisances,  implies  the  right  of  each  citizen 
to  unpolluted  air. 

Under  this  same  head  we  may  conveniently  include 
another  kind  of  trespass  to  which  the  surrounding 
medium  is  instrumental.  I  refer  to  the  production  of 
sounds  of  a  disturbing  kind.  There  are  small  and  large 
trespasses  of  this  class.  For  one  who,  at  a  table  iVJiote, 
speaks  so  loudly  as  to  interfere  with  the  conversation  of 
others,  and  for  those  who,  during  the  performance  at  a 
theatre  or  concert,  persist  in  distracting  the  attention  of 
auditors  around  by  talking,  there  is  reprobation,  if  noth- 
ing more  :  their  acts  are  condemned  as  contrary  to  good 
manners,  that  is,  good  morals,  for  the  one  is  a  part  of 
the  other.  And  then  when  inflictions  of  this  kind  are 
public,  or  continuous,  or  both  —  as  in  the  case  of  street- 
music  and  especially  bad  street-music,  or  as  in  the  case 
of  loud  noises  proceeding  from  factories,  or  as  in  the 
case  of  church-bells  rung  at  early  hours,  the  aggression 
has  come  to  be  legally  recognized  as  such  and  forbidden 
under  penalty :  not  as  yet  sufficiently  recognized,  how- 
ever, as  is  shown  in  the  case  of  railway- whistles  at  cen- 
tral stations,  which  are  allowed  superfluously  to  disturb 
tens  of  thousands  of  people  all  through  the  night,  and 
often  to  do  serious  injury  to  invalids. 

Thus  in  respect  of  the  uses  of  the  atmosphere,  the 
liberty  of  each  limited  only  by  the  like  liberties  of  all, 


"  RIGHTS  TO  THE  USES  OF  NATURAL  MEDIA."      18o 

tliough  not  overtly  asserted,  has  come  to  be  tacitly  as- 
serted ;  in  large  measure  ethically,  and  in  a  considerable 
degree  legally. 

§  52.  The  state  of  things  brought  about  by  civiliza- 
tion does  not  hinder  ready  acceptance  of  the  corollaries 
thus  far  drawn  ;  but  rather  clears  the  way  for  accept- 
ance of  them.  Though  in  the  days  when  cannibalism 
was  common  and  victims  were  frequently  sacrificed  to 
the  gods,  assertion  of  the  right  to  life  might  have  been 
received  with  demur,  yet  the  ideas  and  practices  of  those 
days  have  left  no  such  results  as  stand  in  the  way  of  un- 
biassed judgments.  Though  during  times  when  slavery 
and  serfdom  were  deeply  organized  in  the  social  fabric, 
an  assertion  of  the  right  to  liberty  would  have  roused 
violent  opposition,  yet  at  the  present  time,  among  our- 
selves at  least,  there  exists  no  idea,  sentiment,  or  usage, 
at  variance  with  the  conclusion  that  each  man  is  free  to 
use  his  limbs  and  move  about  where  he  pleases.  And 
similarly  with  respect  to  the  environment.  Such  small 
interferences  with  others'  supplies  of  light  and  air  as 
have  been  bequeathed  in  the  structures  of  old  towns  and 
such  others  as  smoking  fires  entail,  do  not  appreciably 
hinder  acceptance  of  the  proposition  that  men  have 
equal  claims  to  uses  of  the  media  in  which  all  are  im- 
mersed. But  the  proposition  that  men  have  equal 
claims  to  the  use  of  that  remaining  portion  of  the  en- 
vironment —  hardly  to  be  called  a  medium  —  on  which  all 
stand  and  by  the  products  of  which  all  live,  is  antago- 
nized by  ideas  and  arrangements  descending  to  us  from 
the  past.  These  ideas  and  arrangements  arose  when 
considerations  of  equity  did  not  affect  land-tenure  any 
more  than  they  affected  the  tenure  of  men  as  slaves  or 
serfs  ;  and  they  now  make  acceptance  of  the  proposition 
difficult.  If,  while  possessing  those  ethical  sentiments 
which  social  discipline  has  now  produced,  men  stood  in 
possession  of  a  territory  not  yet  individually  portioned 
out,  they  would  no  more  hesitate  to  assert  equality  of 
their  claims  to  the  land  than  they  would  hesitate  to  as- 
sert equality  of  their  claims  to  light  and  air.  But  now 
that  long-standing  appropriation,  continued  culture,  as 
well  as  sales  and  purchases,  have  complicated  matters, 
the  dictum  of  absolute  ethics,  incongruous  with  the  state 


184  liECANTATION. 

of  things  produced,  is  apt  to  be  denied  altogether.  Be- 
fore asking  how,  under  these  circumstances,  we  must 
decide,  let  us  glance  at  some  past  phases  of  land-tenure. 
Partly  because  in  early  stages  of  agriculture,  land, 
soon  exhausted,  soon  ceases  to  be  worth  occupying,  it 
has  been  the  custom  with  little-civilized  and  semi-civ- 
ilized peoples,  for  individuals  to  abandon  after  a  time 
the  tracts  they  have  cleared,  and  to  clear  others.  Causes 
aside,  however,  the  fact  is  that  in  early  stages  private 
ownership  of  land  is  unknown :  only  the  usufruct  be- 
longs to  the  cultivator,  while  the  land  itself  is  tacitly 
regarded  as  the  property  of  the  tribe.  It  is  thus  now 
with  the  Suniatrans  and  others,  and  it  was  thus  with  our 
own  ancestors  :  the  members  of  the  Mark,  while  they 
severally  owned  the  products  of  the  areas  they  respect- 
ively cultivated,  did  not  own  the  areas  themselves. 
Though  it  may  be  said  that  at  first  they  were  members 
of  the  same  family  gens,  or  clan,  and  that  the  ownership 
of  each  tract  was  private  ownership  in  so  far  as  the  tract 
belonged  to  a  cluster  of  relations ;  yet  since  the  same 
kind  of  tenure  continued  after  the  population  of  the 
Mark  had  come  to  include  men  who  were  unrelated  to 
the  rest,  ownership  of  the  tract  by  the  community  and 
not  by  individuals  became  an  established  arrangement. 
This  primitive  condition  will  be  clearly  understood  after 
contemplating  the  case  of  the  llussiaus,  among  whom  it 
has  but  partially  passed  away. 

" 'J'he  village  lands  were  held  in  common  by  all  the  members  of 
the  association  [mir];  the  individual  only  possessed  his  harvest, 
and  the  dvor  or  enclosure  immediately  surrounding  his  house. 
This  primitive  condition  of  property,  existing  in  Russia  up  to  the 
present  day,  was  once  common  to  all  European  peoples."  —  {The 
History  of  Russia,  A.  Kambaud,  trans,  by  Lang,  vol.  i.  p.  45). 

With  this  let  me  join  a  number  of  extracts  from  Wal- 
lace's "  Russia,"  telling  us  of  the  original  state  of  things 
and  of  the  subsequent  states.  After  noting  the  fact 
that  while  the  Don  Cossacks  were  purely  nomadic  — 
"  agriculture  was  prohibited  on  pain  of  death,"  appar- 
ently because  it  interfered  with  hunting  and  cattle- 
breeding,  he  says: — 

"  Each  Cossack  who  wished  to  raise  a  crop  ploughed  and  sowed 
wherever  he  thought  lit,  and  retained  as  long  as  he  chose  the  land 


"  RIGHTS  TO  THE  USES  OF  NATURAL  MEDIA."      185 

thus  appropriated  ;  and  when  the  soil  began  to  show  signs  of  ex- 
haustion, he  abandoned  liis  plot  and  ploughed  elsewhere.  As  the 
number  of  agriculturists  increased,  quarrels  frequently  arose.  Still 
worse  evils  appeared  when  markets  were  created  in  the  vicinity. 
In  some  stamtzas  [Cossack  villages]  the  richer  families  appropriated 
enormous  quantities  of  the  common  land  by  using  several  teams  of 
oxen,  or  by  hiring- peasants  in  the  nearest  villages  to  come  and 
plough  for  them  ;  and  instead  of  abandoning  the  land  after  raising 
two  or  three  crops  they  retained  possession  of  it.  Thus  the  whole 
of  the  arable  land,  or  at  least  the  best  parts  of  it,  become  actually, 
if  not  legally,  the  private  property  of  a  few  families." — {lb.  ii.  80). 

Then  he  explains  that  as  a  consequence  of  something 
like  a  revolution  : 

"  In  accordance  with  their  [the  landless  members  of  the  com- 
munity's] demands  the  appropriated  land  was  confiscated  by  the 
Commune  and  the  system  of  periodical  distributions  .  .  .  was  in- 
troduced. By  this  system  each  male  adult  possesses  a  share  of  the 
land."— (16.  ii.  87). 

On  the  Steppes  "  a  plot  of  land  is  commonly  cultivated  for  only 
three  or  four  years  in  succession.  It  is  then  abandoned  for  at 
least  double  that  period,  and  the  cultivators  remove  to  some  other 
portion  of  the  communal  territoiy.  .  .  .  Under  such  circumstances 
the  principle  of  private  property  in  the  land  is  not  likely  to  strike 
root ;  each  family  insists  on  possessing  a  certain  quantity  rather 
than  a  certain  plot  of  land,  and  contents  itself  with  a  right  of  usu- 
fruct, whilst  the  right  of  property  remains  in  the  hands  of  the  Com- 
mune."—(I&.  ii.  91). 

But  in  the  central  and  more  advanced  districts  this  early- 
practice  has  become  modified,  though  without  destroying 
the  essential  character  of  the  tenure, 

"  According  to  this  system  [the  three-field  system]  the  cultivators 
do  not  migrate  periodically  from  one  part  of  the  communal  territory 
to  another,  but  till  always  the  same  fields,  and  are  obliged  to  manure 
the  plots  which  they  occupy.  .  .  .  Though  the  three-field  system 
has  been  in  use  for  many  generations  in  the  central  provinces,  the 
communal  principle,  with  its  periodical  re-allotment  of  the  land, 
still  remains  intact."  —  (16.  ii.  92). 

Such  facts,  and  numerous  other  such  facts,  put  beyond 
question  the  conclusion  that  before  the  progress  of  social 
organization  changed  the  relations  of  individuals  to  the 
soil,  that  relation  was  one  of  joint  ownersliip  and  not 
one  of  individual  ownership. 

How  was  this  relation  changed?  How  only  could 
it  be  changed  ?  Certainly  not  by  unforced  consent. 
It  cannot  be  supposed  that  all,  or  some,  of  the  members 


186  RECANTATION. 

of  the  community  willingly  surrendered  their  respective 
claims.  Crime  now  and  again  caused  loss  of  an  individ- 
ual's share  in  the  joint  ownership;  but  this  must  have 
left  the  relations  of  the  rest  to  the  soil  unchanged.  A 
kindred  result  might  have  been  entailed  by  debt,  were  it 
not  that  debt  implies  a  creditor ;  and  while  it  is  scarcely 
supposable  that  the  creditor  could  be  the  community  as 
a  whole,  indebtedness  to  any  individual  of  it  would  not 
empower  the  debtor  to  transfer  in  payment  something 
of  which  he  was  not  individually  possessed,  and  which 
could  not  be  individually  received.  Probably  elsewhere 
there  came  into  play  the  cause  described  as  having  oper- 
ated in  Russia,  where  some,  cultivating  larger  areas  than 
others,  accumulated  wealth  and  consequent  power,  and 
extra  possessions ;  but,  as  is  implied  by  the  fact  that  in 
Russia  this  led  to  a  revolution  and  re-institution  of  the 
original  state,  the  process  was  evidently  there,  and  prob- 
ably elsewhere,  regarded  as  aggressive.  Obviously  the 
chief  cause  must  have  been  the  exercise  of  direct  or 
indirect  force :  sometimes  internal  but  chiefly  externaL 
Disputes  and  fights  within  the  community,  leading  to 
predominance  (achieved  in  some  cases  by  possession  of 
fortified  houses)  prepared  the  way  for  partial  usurpa- 
tions. When,  as  among  the  Suanetians,  we  have  a  still- 
extant  case  in  which  every  family  in  a  village  has  its 
tower  of  defence,  we  may  well  understand  how  the  in- 
testine feuds  in  early  communities  commonly  brought 
about  individual  supremacies,  and  how  these  ended  in 
the  establishment  of  special  claims  upon  the  land  subor- 
dinating the  general  claims. 

But  conquest  from  without  has  everywhere  been 
chiefly  instrumental  in  superseding  communal  proprietor- 
ship by  individual  proprietorship.  It  is  not  to  be  sup- 
posed- that  in  times  when  captive  men  were  made  slaves 
and  women  appropriated  as  spoils  of  war,  much  respect 
was  paid  to  pre-existing  ownership  of  the  soil.  The  old 
English  buccaneers  who,  in  their  descents  on  the  coast, 
slew  priests  at  the  altars,  set  fire  to  churches,  and  mas- 
sacred the  people  who  had  taken  refuge  in  them,  would 
have  been  very  incomprehensible  beings  had  they  recog- 
nized the  land-ownership  of  such  as  survived.  When 
the  pirate  Danes,  who  in  later  days  ascended  the  rivers, 
had  burnt  the  hou:iesteads  they  came  upon,  slaughtered 


"  RIGHTS  TO  THE  USES  OF  NATtJRAL  MEDIA."      187 

the  men,  violated  the  women,  tossed  children  on  pikes 
or  sold  them  in  theniarket-place,  they  must  have  under- 
gone a  miraculous  transformation  had  they  thereafter 
inquired  to  whom  the  Marks  belonged,  and  admitted  the 
titles  of  their  victims  to  them.  And  similarly  when, 
two  centuries  later,  after  constant  internal  wars  had 
already  produced  military  rulers  maintaining  quasi-feudal 
claims  over  occupiers  of  lands,  there  came  the  invading 
Normans,  the  right  of  conquest  once  more  overrode  such 
kinds  of  possession  as  had  grown  up,  and  still  further 
merged  communal  proprietorship  in  that  kind  of  indi- 
vidual proprietorship  which  characterized  feudalism. 
Victory,  which  gives  unqualified  power  over  the  defeated 
and  their  belongings,  is  followed,  according  to  the  nature 
of  the  race,  by  the  assertion  of  universal  ownership, 
more  or  less  qualified  according  to  the  dictates  of  policy. 
While  in  some  cases,  as  in  Dahomey,  there  results  abso- 
lute monopoly  by  the  king,  not  only  of  the  land  but  of 
everything  else,  there  results  in  other  cases,  as  there 
resulted  in  England,  supreme  ownership  by  the  king 
with  recognized  sub-ownerships  and  sub-sub-ownerships 
of  nobles  and  their  vassals  holding  the  land  one  under 
another,  on  condition  of  military  service :  supreme  own- 
ership being,  by  implication,  vested  in  the  crown. 

Both  the  original  state  and  the  subsequent  states  have 
left  their  traces  in  existing  land-laws.  There  are  many 
local  rights  which  date  from  a  time  when  "  private 
property  in  land,  as  we  now  understand  it,  was  a  strug- 
gling novelty."  * 

"  The  people  who  exercise  rights  of  common  exercise  them  by  a 
title  which,  if  we  could  only  trace  it  all  the  way  back,  is  far  more  i 
ancient  than  the  lord's.     Their  rights  are  those  which  belonged  to 
the  members  of  tlie  village  community  long  before  manors  and 
lords  of  the  manor  were  heard  of."  t 

And  any  one  who  observes  what  small  tenderness  for  the 
rights  of  commoners  is  shown  in  the  obtainmeut  of 
Inclosure-Acts,  even  in  our  own  day,  will  be  credulous 
indeed  if  he  thinks  that  in  ruder  times  the  lapse  of 
communal  right  into  private  rights  was  equitably  ef- 
fected. The  private  ownership,  however,  was  habitually 
incomplete ;  since  it  was  subject  to  the  claims  of  the 
over-lord,  and  through  him,  again,  to  those  of  the  over- 

*  The  Land  Laws,  by  SirFredk.  Pollock,  Bart.,  p.  2.  t  Ibid.,  p.  6. 


188  KECANTATION. 

over-lord  :  the  iinplication  being  that  the  ownership  was 
subordinate  to  that  of  the  liead  of  the  community. 

"No  absolute  ownerslnp  of  land  is  recognized  by  our  law-books 
except  in  the  Crown.  All  lands  are  supposed  to  be  held  imme- 
diately, or  mediately,  of  the  Crown,  though  no  rent  or  services 
may  be  payable,  and  no  grant  from  the  Crown  on  record."  * 

And  that  this  conception  of  land-ownership  survives, 
alike  in  theory  and  in  practice,  to  the  present  time,  is 
illustrated  by  the  fact  that  year  by  year  State-authority 
is  given  for  appropriating  land  for  public  purposes,  after 
making  due  compensation  to  existing  holders.  Though 
it  may  be  replied  that  this  claim  of  the  State  to  supreme 
land-ownership  is  but  a  part  of  its  claim  to  supreme 
ownership  in  general,  since  it  assumes  the  right  to  take 
anything  on  giving  compensation  ;  yet  the  first  is  an 
habitually-enforced  claim,  while  the  other  is  but  a  nomi- 
nal claim  not  enforced ;  as  we  see  in  the  purchase  of 
pictures  for  the  nation,  to  effect  which  the  State  enters 
into  competition  with  private  buyers,  and  may  or  may 
not  succeed. 

It  remains  only  to  point  out  that  tlie  political  changes 
which  have  slowly  replaced  the  supreme  power  of  the 
monarch  by  the  supreme  power  of  the  people,  have,  by 
implication,  replaced  the  monarch's  supreme  ownership 
of  the  land  by  tlie  people's  supreme  ownership  of  the 
land.  If  the  representative  body  has  practically  in- 
herited the  governmental  powers  which  in  past  times 
vested  in  the  king,  it  has  at  the  same  time  inherited  that 
ultimate  proprietorship  of  the  soil  wliich  in  past  times 
vested  in  liim.  And  since  the  representative  body  is 
but  the  agent  of  the  community,  this  ultimate  })roprie- 
torship  now  vests  in  the  community.  Nor  is  this  denied 
by  land-owners  themselves.  The  report  issued  in  Decem- 
ber, 1889,  by  the  council  of  "  The  Liberty  and  Property 
Defence  League,"  on  which  sit  several  Peers  and  two 
judges,  yields  proof.  After  saying  that  the  essential 
principle  of  their  organization,  '"based  upon  recorded 
experience,"  is  a  distrust  of  "  officialism,  imperial  or  mu- 
nicipal," the  council  go  on  to  say  that :  — 

"  This  principle  applied  to  the  case  of  land  clearly  points  to  indi- 
vidual ownership,  qualified  by  State-suzerainty.  .  .  .  The  land  can 
of  course  be  '  resumed  '  on  payment  of  full  compensation,  and  man- 
aged by  the  '  people',  if  they  so  will  it." 

♦  The  Land  Laws,  by  Sir  Tredk.  Pollock,  Bart.,  p.  12. 


"RIGHTS  TO  THE  USES  OP  NATURAL  MEDIA."      18D 

And  the  badness  of  the  required  system  of  administra- 
tion is  the  only  reason  urged  for  maintaining  the  exist- 
ing system  of  land-holding:  the  supreme  ownershij)  of 
the  community  being  avowedly  recognized.  So  that 
whereas,  in  early  stages,  along  with  the  freedom  of  each 
man,  there  went  joint  ownership  of  the  soil  by  the  body 
of  men  ;  and  whereas,  during  the  long  periods  of  that 
militant  activity  by  which  small  communities  were  con- 
solidated into  great  ones,  there  simultaneously  resulted 
loss  of  individual  freedom  and  loss  of  participation  in 
land-ownership ;  there  has,  with  the  decline  of  militancy 
and  the  growth  of  industrialism,  been  a  re-acquirement 
of  individual  freedom  and  a  re-acquirement  of  such 
participation  in  land-ownership  as  is  implied  by  a  share 
in  appointing  the  body  by  which  the  land  is  now 
held.  And  the  implication  is  that  the  members  of  the 
community,  habitually  exercising  as  they  do,  through 
their  representatives,  the  power  of  alienating  and  using 
as  they  think  well,  any  portion  of  the  land,  may  equit- 
ably appropriate  and  use,  if  they  think  fit,  all  portions 
of  the  land.  But  since  equity  and  daily  custom  alike 
imply  that  existing  holders  of  particular  portions  of  land, 
may  not  be  dispossessed  without  giving  them  in  return 
its  fairly-estimated  value,  it  is  also  implied  that  the 
wholesale  resumption  of  the  land  by  the  community  can 
be  jvTstly  effected  only  by  wholesale  purchase  of  it.  Were 
the  direct  exercise  of  ownership  to  be  resumed  by  the 
community  without  purchase,  the  community  would  take, 
along  with  something  which  is  its  own,  an  immensely 
greater  amount  of  something  which  is  not  its  own.  Even 
if  we  ignore  those  multitudinous  complications  which,  in 
the  course  of  century  after  century,  have  inextricably 
entangled  men's  claims,  theoretically  considered  —  even 
if  we  reduce  the  case  to  its  simplest  theoretical  form  ; 
we  must  admit  that  all  which  can  be  claimed  for  the 
community  is  the  surface  of  the  country  in  its  original 
unsubdued  state.  To  all  that  value  given  to  it  by  clear- 
ing, breaking-up,  prolonged  cult\ire,  fencing,  draining, 
making  roads,  farm  buildings,  etc.,  constituting  nearly 
all  its  value,  the  community  has  no  claim.  This  value 
has  been  given  either  by  personal  labor,  or  by  labor  paid 
for,  or  by  ancestral  labor ;  or  else  the  value  given  to  it 
in  such  ways  has  been  purchased  by  legitimately  earned 


190  RECANTATION. 

money.  All  this  value  artificially  given  vests  in  existing 
owners,  and  cannot  without  a  gigantic  robbery  be  taken 
from  them.  If,  during  the  many  transactions  which 
have  brought  about  existing  land-ownership,  there  have 
been  much  violence  and  much  fraud,  these  have  been 
small  compared  with  the  violence  and  the  fraud  which 
the  community  would  be  guilty  of  did  it  take  posses- 
sion, without  paying  for  it,  of  that  artificial  value,  which 
the  labor  of  nearly  two  thousand  years  has  given  to  the 
land. 


§  53.  Reverting  to  the  general  topic  of  the  chapter  — 
the  rights  to  the  uses  of  natural  media  —  it  chiefly  con- 
cerns us  here  to  note  the  way  in  which  these  rights  have 
gradually  acquired  legislative  sanctions  as  societies  have 
advanced  to  higher  types. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  chapter  we  saw  that  in  mod- 
ern times  there  have  arisen  legal  assertions  of  men's 
equal  rights  to  the  uses  of  light  and  air:  no  forms  of 
social  organization  or  class-interests  having  appreciably 
hindered  recognition  of  these  corollaries  from  the  law  of 
equal  freedom.  And  we  have  just  seen  that  by  implica- 
tion, if  not  in  any  overt  or  conscious  way,  there  has  in 
our  days  been  recognized  the  equal  rights  of  all  electors 
to  supreme  ownership  of  the  inhabited  area  —  rights 
which,  though  latent,  are  asserted  by  every  Act  of  Par- 
liament which  alienates  land.  Though  this  right  to 
the  use  of  the  Earth,  possessed  by  each  citizen,  is  tra- 
versed by  established  arrangements  to  so  great  an  ex- 
tent as  to  be  practically  suspended ;  yet  its  existence  as 
an  equitable  claim  cannot  be  denied  without  affirming 
that  expropriation  by  State-decree  is  inequitable.  The 
right  of  an  existing  holder  of  land  can  be  equitably 
superseded,  only  if  there  exists  a  prior  right  of  the  com- 
munity at  large ;  and  this  prior  right  of  the  community 
at  large  consists  of  the  sum  of  the  individual  rights 
of  its  members. 


Note.  Various  considerations  touching  this  vexed 
question  of  land-ownership,  which  would  occupy  too  much 
space  if  included  here,  I  have  included  in  Appendix  B. 


"RIGHTS  Tf)  THE  USES  OF  NATURAL  MEDIA."      191 

Let  US  take  breath  and  gather  our  wits.  It  is  like 
going  through  a  St.  Gothard  tunnel.  Here  we  are  on 
the  other  side,  sure  enough!  But  how  did  we  get 
there  ? 

Mr.  Spencer  brought  us  in,  asserting  the  law  of 
equal  freedom  as  "an  ultimate  ethical  principle, 
having  an  authority  transcending  every  other ; "  de- 
claring that  "rights  truly  so  called  are  corollaries  from 
tlie  law  of  equal  freedom,  and  what  are  falsely  called 
rights  are  not  deducible  from  it." 

He  brings  us  out,  with  a  confused  but  unmistaka])le 
assertion  that  tlie  freedom  to  use  land  belongs  only 
to  the  small  class  of  landlords ;  with  an  assertion  of 
the  strongest  kind  of  their  right  to  deprive  all  other 
men  of  freedom  to  use  the  earth  until  they  are  paid 
for  it. 

How  has  he  got  there  ? 

Has  he  shown  that  the  law  of  equal  freedom  gives 
freedom  to  the  use  of  land  only  to  a  few  men  and  denies 
it  to  all  other  men?  Has  he  shown  that  the  right  so- 
called  of  the  small  class  of  land-owners  to  the  exclu- 
sive use  of  land  is  a  true  right  and  not  a  false  right, 
by  deducing  it  from  the  law  of  equal  freedom?  Has 
he  met  one  of  the  conditions  called  for  by  his  elaborate 
derivation  and  formula  of  jnstice  in  the  preceding 
chapters  of  this  very  book  ?  Has  he  shown  the  in- 
validity of  a  single  one  of  the  deductions  by  which 
he  proved  in  "  Social  Statics  "  that  justice  does  not 
permit  private  property  in  land  ? 

It  is  worth  while  to  examine  this  chapter  in  detail. 
Its  argument  is  divisible  into  two  parts  —  (1)  as  to 
the  right  to  the  use  of  light,  air,  etc.,  and  (2)  as 
to  the  right  to  the  use  of  land.  Let  us  consider  the 
one  part  before  passing  to  the  other. 


CHAPTER   VII. 

"justice"  on  the  eight  to  light  and  air. 

Mr.  Spencer's  carelessness  of  thought  is  shown  in 
the  very  opening  sentence  of  this  chapter  on  "  The 
Right  to  the  Uses  of  Natural  Media :  " 

A  man  may  be  entirely  uninjured  in  body  by  the 
action  of  fellow-men,  and  he  may  be  entirely  unimpeded 
in  his  movements  by  them,  and  he  may  yet  be  prevented 
from  carrying  on  the  activities  needful  for  maintenance 
of  life,  by  traversing  his  relations  to  the  physical  envi- 
ronment on  which  his  life  depends. 

How? 

To  ordinary  apprehension,  the  only  way  in  which 
men  can  be  deprived  of  the  use  of  "  the  physical  en- 
vironment on  which  life  depends  "  is  either  by  such 
bodily  injuries  as  killing,  maiming,  binding,  imprison- 
ing, or  by  such  restrictions  on  movement  as  have  the 
threat  of  bodilj-  injury  behind  them,  like  the  taboo 
among  the  South  Sea  Islanders,  or  private  property  in 
land  among  us.  Nor  have  the  tyrants  of  the  M'orld, 
much  as  they  would  have  liked  to,  ever  been  able  to 
find  any  other  way. 

Without  condescending  to  explain,  Mr.  Spencer 
goes  on  to  quote  Erskine  to  the  effect  that  "  the 
light,  the  air,  running  water,  etc.,  are  so  adapted  to 
the  common  use  of  mankind  that  no  individual  can 
acquire  a  property  in  them  or  dej^rive  others  of  their 
use." 


.  "JUSTICE  "  ON  THE  KIGHT  TO  LIGHT  AND  AIR.      193 

This  again  sliows  carelessness  in  apprehension  and 
statement.  What  Eiskiiie  really  means  is  that  the 
law  does  not,  and  that  Ixnause  it  ean  not,  give 
property  in  the  substance  of  matter,  so  that  the 
molecules  or  atoms  of  which  it  is  composed  may  be 
identified  and  reclaimed  through  all  changes  in 
form  or  place ;  but  that  ownership  can  only  attach 
to  matter  in  its  relation  to  form  or  place.  For  in- 
stance, I  buy  to-day  a  dog  or  a  horse.  I  acquire  in 
this  purchase  the  ownership  of  what  matter  is  now, 
or  at  any  time  in  the  future  may  be,  contained  in  the 
form  of  this  dog  or  horse,  not  the  ownership  of  a 
certain  amount  of  matter  in  whatever  form  it  may 
hereafter  assume.  That  no  law  could  give  me,  nor 
could  I  even  set  up  a  claim  to  it,  for  it  would  be  im- 
possible for  me  to  identify  it.  For  the  matter  which 
my  dog  or  horse  embodies  for  the  moment,  like  the 
matter  of  which  my  own  frame  is  composed,  is  con- 
stantly passing  from  that  form  to  other  forms.  The, 
only  thing  tangible  to  me  or  other  men  is  this  form. 
And  it  is  in  this  that  ownership  consists.  If  my  dog 
eats  your  mutton  chop,  your  property  in  the  chop 
does  not  become  property  in  the  dog.  If  the  law 
gives  you  any  action  it  is  certainly  not  that  of 
replevin. 

The  principle  of  the  law  that  Erskine  refers  to  is 
thus  stated  by  Blackstone  (Chapter  2,  Book  II.) : 

I  cannot  bring  an  action  to  recover  possession  of  a 
pool  or  other  piece  of  water  either  by  superficial  measure 
for  twenty  acres  of  water  or  by  general  description,  as 
for  a  pond  or  a  rivulet;  but  I  must  bring  my  action  for 
what  lies  at  the  bottom  and  call  it  twenty  acres  of  land 
covered  with  water.  For  ^vater  is  a  movable,  wandering 
thing,  and  must  of  necessity  continue  common  by  the 


194  RECANTATION. 

law  of  nature,  so  that  I  can  only  have  a  temporary, 
transient,  usufructuary  property  ;  wherefore  if  a  body 
of  water  runs  out  of  my  pond  into  another  man's  I  have 
no  right  to  reclaim  it.  But  the  land  which  that  water 
covers  is  permanent,  fixed  and  immovable,  and  there- 
fore in  this  I  may  have  a  certain  substantial  property,  of 
which  the  law  will  take  notice  and  not  of  the  other. 

Now  the  comparatively  rough  distinctions  that  are 
amply  sufficient  for  the  purposes  of  the  lawyer  are 
not  always  sufficient  for  the  purposes  of  the  philoso- 
pher. If  we  analyze  this  principle  of  the  law,  we 
see  that  no  real  distinction  is  made  as  to  ownership 
between  the  substance  of  water  and  the  substance  of 
land  —  that  is  to  say,  between  the  more  or  less  stable 
forms  of  matter  of  which  the  body  of  the  universe 
consists.  The  distinction  is  as  to  tangible  form.  I 
may  bring  an  action  for  ice,  which  is  water  that  has 
assumed  tangible  form  by  the  lowering  of  tempera- 
ture, or  for  water  in  barrels  or  bottles,  which  in  another 
way  gives  it  form.  And  the  real  reason  why  in  an 
action  for  the  possession  of  a  body  of  water  I  must 
describe  it  as  land  covered  by  water  is  that  it  is  the 
land  which  holds  the  water  in  place  and  gives  it 
form. 

So,  on  the  other  hand,  if  a  freshet  or  a  water-burst 
carry  the  fertile  soil  from  my  field  into  that  of  my 
neighbor,  I  can  no  more  reclaim  it  by  action  at  law 
than  I  can  reclaim  the  water  tliat  runs  out  of  my 
pond.  Or  if  a  volcanic  convulsion  were  to  shift  the 
position  of  a  mineral  deposit,  it  would  cease  to  belong 
to  one  land-owner  and  the  other  would  acquire  legal 
possession.  The  legal  result  would  be  precisely  the 
same  as  the  legal  result  of  a  change  in  a  rivulet's 
course.     In  ruder  times,  ere  the  art  of  surveying  was 


"JUSTICE  "  ON  THE  UIGHT  TO  LIGKT  AND  AIll.       195 

SO  well  developed  as  now,  it  was  customary  to  fix 
the  boundaries  of  legal  possession  by  natural  objects 
deemed  immovable,  such  as  mountains,  ocean  shores, 
rivers,  etc.,  and  in  places  where  this  method  has  been 
retained  changes  in  hmdmarks  frequently  change  the 
ownership  of  considerable  bodies  of  land,  as  on  the 
shifting  banks  of  the  lower  Mississippi.  But  our 
modern  surveying  takes  for  its  bases  latitude  and  lon- 
gitude. And  this  is  the  essential  idea  of  land  owner- 
ship :  It  is  the  ownership,  not  of  certain  atoms  of 
matter,  be  they  rock,  soil,  water  or  air,  or  of  certain 
forms  of  energy,  such  as  heat,  light  or  electricity,  but 
the  ownership  of  a  certain  section  of  space  and  of  all 
that  may  be  therein  contained. 

Mr.  Spencer  is  confusing  two  essentially  different 
ideas  —  the  idea  of  substance  and  the  idea  of  form 
or  locality.  In  the  one  sense  nothing  whatever  may 
be  owned  —  land  no  more  than  light  or  electricity. 
In  the  other,  all  natural  substances  and  powers  may 
be  owned  —  water,  air,  light,  heat  or  electricity,  as 
truly  as  land.  And  they  are  owned,  though,  since  in 
our  legal  terminology  space  and  its  contents  are 
known  as  land,  they  must  in  law  be  described  as  land. 
Whoever,  under  our  laws,  acquires  ownership  in  land 
mai/  deprive  others  of  light,  air,  running  water,  etc., 
and  does  acquire  a  property  in  their  use,  which  is 
frequently  a  tangible  element,  and  at  times  the  only 
element  in  the  value  of  an  estate — as  where  the 
purity  of  the  air,  the  beauty  of  the  view,  the  abun- 
dance of  sunlight  which  a  favorable  exposure  gives, 
the  presence  of  mineral  springs,  or  the  access  to 
streams,  are  elements  in  the  price  at  which  land  can 
be  sold  or  rented. 


196  RECANTATION. 

In  the  next  sentence  we  are  told  that  "  light  and 
air  cannot  be  monopolized."  But  they  are  monop- 
olized in  the  monopolization  of  land,  and  this  as 
effectually  as  any  monopolizer  could  wish.  It  is  true 
that  air  and  sunlight  are  not  formally  bought,  sold 
and  rented.  But  why  ?  Not  that  they  could  not  be 
measured  off  and  determined  by  metes  and  bounds, 
but  simply  because  they  are  to  our  physical  constitu- 
tions inseparable  from  land,  so  that  whoever  owns 
the  land  owns  also  the  air  it  is  bathed  in  and  the  light 
that  falls  on  it.  Light  and  air  are  monopolized  when- 
ever land  is  monopolized ;  and  the  exclusive  use  to 
them  is  bought  and  sold  whenever  land  is  bought 
and  sold. 

It  is  not  merely  that,  as  the  flying-machine  has  not 
yet  been  perfected,  the  owner  of  land  holds  the 
means  of  access  to  the  air  above  it  and  the  light  that 
falls  on  it ;  it  is  that  the  owner  of  land  is  the  owner 
of  such  light  and  air,  not  merely  virtually,  but  for- 
mally and  legally.  And  were  the  air-ship  perfected,  he 
would  have  the  same  legal  right  to  forbid  trespass  on 
his  light  and  air,  and  to  demand  payment  for  any 
use  made  of  it  or  any  passage  through  it,  thousands 
of  feet  above  the.  surface,  as  he  now  has  to  forbid 
trespass  on  his  ground  or  to  demand  payment  for 
any  use  of  or  any  passage  through  what  lies  thou- 
sands of  feet  below  it.  In  English  law,  land  does 
not  mean  merely  the  surface  of  the  earth  within 
certain  metes  and  bounds,  but  all  that  may  be  above 
and  all  that  may  be  below  that  surface ;  and  under 
the  same  legal  right  by  which  the  land-owner  holds 
as  his  private  property  any  certain  part  of  the  surface 
of  the  globe  he  also  holds  the  rocks  and  minerals 


"justice"  on  the  right  to  light  and  air.     197 

below  it  and  tlie  air  and  the  light  above  it.  As 
Blackstone  says:  "The  word  'land'  includes  not 
only  the  face  of  the  earth,  but  everything  under  it 
or  over  it.  .  .  .  By  the  name  of  land  everj^thing 
terrestrial  will  pass.''  The  land-owner  is,  in  law  as 
well  as  in  fact,  not  a  mere  surface  owner,  but  a  uni- 
verse owner.  And  just  as  in  some  places  land-owners 
sell  the  surface  right,  retaining  mineral  rights ;  or 
sell  mineral  rights,  retaining  surface  rights  ;  or  sell 
the  right  of  way,  retaining  rights  to  other  use :  so, 
where  there  is  occasion,  the  right  to  use  light  and 
air  may  be  separated,  in  sales  and  purchases  and 
title-deeds,  from  the  right  to  the  use  of  the  ground. 

An  invention  which  would  make  practicable  the  use 
of  light  and  air  without  possession  of  the  surface, 
would  at  once  bring  out  the  fact  that,  legally,  they 
belong  to  land-owners,  just  as  subterranean  mining 
and  the  projection  of  underground  railways  have 
brought  out  the  fact  that  land-owners  are  legal  own- 
ers of  all  beneath  the  surface.  In  fact,  existing 
deeds  furnish  instances  in  which  the  real  thing 
bought  and  sold,  though  properly  enough  styled  land 
in  the  conveyances,  is  not  land  at  all  in  the  narrow 
meaning,  but  liglit  and  air,  or  the  right  to  their  use. 
To  cite  a  case :  The  city  of  Cleveland,  Ohio,  some 
years  since,  desired  to  convert  the  viaduct  bridge 
over  the  Cuyahoga  river  into  a  swinging  bridge. 
To  do  this  it  was  necessary  that  one  end  of  the 
bridge  should  in  its  swing  pass  for  a  short  distance 
through  the  air  over  a  strip  of  land  belonging  to  a 
private  owner.  The  city  of  Cleveland  had,  there- 
fore, to  buy  the  right  to  use  this  air,  and  I  have 
before  me  a  copy  of  the  deed,  executed  on  the  28th 


198  HECANTATION.  ^ 

of  February,  1880,  by  which,  in  consideration  of 
$9,994.88,  Me3'ers,  Rouse  &  Co.  sell  and  convey  to 
the  city  of  Cleveland  the  right  to  swing  such  bridge 
over  a  small  area  thirty-five  feet  above  the  ground. 
Of  this  estate  in  the  air  the  grantors  describe  them- 
selves as  holding  a  good  and  indefeasible  title  in  fee 
simple,  with  the  right  to  bargain  and  sell  the  same. 
Were  it  thirty-five  hundred  or  thirty-five  hundred 
thousand  feet  above  the  surface,  the  legal  right  of 
ownership  would  be  the  same.  For  the  ownership 
which  attaches  to  land  under  our  laws  is  not  to  be 
really  measured  by  linear  feet  and  inches,  but  by 
parallels  of  latitude  and  meridians  of  longitude,  start- 
ing from  the  centre  of  the  earth  and  indefinitely  ex- 
tendible. And  while  Meyers,  Rouse  &  Co.  have  sold 
to  the  city  of  Cleveland  a  slice  of  their  air  of  perhaps 
fifteen  feet  in  depth,  they  still  retain  the  legal  owner- 
ship of  all  the  air  above  it,  and  could  demand  toll  of 
or  refuse  passage  to  any  flying  machine  that  should 
attempt  to  cross  it. 

The  same  lack  of  analytic  power  continues  to  be 
shown  by  Mr.  Spencer  when  he  goes  on  to  tell  us  that 
the  equal  rights  to  the  use  of  light  and  air,  though 
not  recognized  in  primitive  stages,  have,  in  the 
course  of  social  evolution,  come  to-  be  completely  or 
all  but  completely  recognized  now.  So  far  is  this 
from  being  true,  that  in  such  countries  as  England 
and  the  United  States  there  is  no  recognition  what^ 
ever  of  the  equal  right  to  the  use  of  light  and  air.  To 
the  list  of  interdictions  which  he  cites  as  recognitions 
of  this  equal  right,  he  might  as  well  have  added  that 
of  shying  bricks  through  these  media  at  passers-by. 
For  where  the  interdictions  lie  mentions  —  of  inter- 


"justice"  on  the  right  to  ligiA  and  air.    199 

ceptions  of  light  and  air,  of  smoking  in  certain 
places,  of  the  maintenance  of  stenches  and  fumes,  of 
the  making  of  disturbing  noises  —  are  not  mere  inter- 
dictions of  certain  species  of  assault ;  they  are  inter- 
dictions based  on  and  involved  in  the  ownership  of 
land. 

Mr.  Spencer  might  have  seen  this  for  himself, 
where  he  speaks  of  "  the  law  which  forbids  the  build- 
ing of  walls,  houses,  or  other  edifices  within  prescribed 
distances  of  other  houses  .  .  .  and  seeks  to  compro- 
mise the  claims  of  adjacent  owners  as  fairly  as  seem 
practicable." 

Owners  of  what?  Why,  owners  of  land.  It  is 
only  as  an  owner  of  land,  or  as  the  tenant  of  an 
owner  of  land,  that  under  our  English  law  any  one 
has  a  riglit  to  complain  of  the  interception  of  light 
and  air  by  another  land-owner.  The  owner  of  land 
may  intercept  light  and  air,  may  make  noises  and 
create  stenches  to  any  extent  he  pleases,  provided  he 
infringes  not  the  equal  rights  of  other  owners  of  land, 
for  light  and  air  are  considered  by  English  law  as 
what  they  truly  are,  so  far  as  human  beings  are  con- 
cerned, appurtenances  of  land.  No  one  in  England, 
be  he  stranger  or  native  born,  has  any  legal  right 
whatever  to  the  use  of  Ens^lish  liaht  and  Eng^lish  air, 
save  as  the  owner  or  n^rantee  of  an  owner  of  Eno^lish 
land.  That  even  on  the  Queen's  highways  the  public 
are  deemed  to  have  such  rights  as  against  adjacent 
land-holders  I  am  not  sure.  Certain  it  is,  that  one 
may  travel  for  miles  through  the  public  roads,  amid 
the  finest  scenery  in  those  countries,  and  find  the  view 
wantonly  shut  out  by  high  and  costly  walls,  erected 
for  the  express  purpose  of  intercepting  the  light,  and 


200  UECANTATION. 

crowned  on  their  tops  with  broken  glass,  to  tear  the 
clothes  and  cut  the  flesh  of  any  one  who  dares  climl) 
them  to  get  such  a  view  as  the  unintercepted  liglit 
would  give. 

The  rights  to  the  use  of  light,  air  and  other  natural 
media  are  in  truth  as  inseparable  from  the  right  to 
the  use  of  land  as  the  bottom  of  that  atmospheric 
ocean  which  surrounds  our  globe  is  inseparable  from 
the  globe's  surface ;  and  the  pretence  of  treating  them 
separately  could  only  spring  from  Mr.  Spencer's 
evident  desire  to  confuse  the  subject  he  is  pretending 
to  treat,  to  cover  with  a  fog  of  words  his  abandonment 
of  a  position  incapable  of  refutation,  and  from  the 
false  assumption  that  the  liberty  of  each  to  the  use 
of  air  and  light,  limited  only  by  the  like  liberty  of  all, 
is  practically  and  legally  recognized,  to  lead  to  tiie 
still  more  preposterously  false  assumption  that  equal 
rights  to  the  use  of  land  are  also  fully  recognized. 

But  before  examining  this  last  assumption,  there 
is  one  form  of  it  which  he  incidentally  makes  that 
is  worth  noticing  —  the  assumption  that  the  equal 
right  to  personal  liberty  and  freedom  of  movement  is 
already  fully  recognized. 

It  is  a  pity  that  Mr.  Spencer  had  not  intermitted 
his  studies  of  the  Abors,  the  Bodas,  the  Creeks,  the 
Dhimals,  the  Eghas,  and  other  queer  people,  to  the 
end  of  the  alphabet,  of  whom  his  later  books  are  as 
full  as  those  of  the  pedants  of  the  last  century  v/ere 
of  classical  quotations,  and  made  some  obserA^ations 
in  his  own  countr3\  They  would  have  saved  him 
from  the  astounding  statement  that  — 

At  the  present  time,  among  ourselves  at  least,  there 
exists  no  idea,  sentiment,  or  usage  at  variance  with  the 


''justice"  on  the  right  to  light  and  air.     201 

conclusion  that  each  man  is  free  to  use  his  limbs  and 
move  where  he  pleases. 

The  truth  is,  that  instead  of  every  one  being  free 
in  England  "  to  use  his  limbs  and  move  about  where 
he  pleases,"  there  is  no  part  of  the  British  Isles,  even 
though  it  be  wild  moor,  bleak  deer-forest  or  bare 
mountain-top,  where  a  man  is  free  to  move  about 
without  permission  of  the  private  owner,  except  it 
be  the  highroads,  the  public  places,  or  other  strips 
and  spots  of  laud  deemed  the  property  of  the  com- 
munity. 

Mr.  Spencer  seems  to  have  forgotten  this  now,  but 
he  knew  it  when  in  "  Social  Statics  "  he  denounced 
the  system  that  permitted  the  Duke  of  Leeds  to  warn 
off  tourists  from  Ben-muich-Dhui,  the  Duke  of  Atholl 
to  close  Glen  Tilt,  the  Duke  of  Buccleuch  to  deny 
Free  Church  sites,  and  the  Duke  of  Sutherland  to 
displace  Highlanders  with  deer. 

"  Verily,  they  have  their  reward."  The  name  of 
Herbert  Spencer  now  appears  with  those  of  about  all 
the  Dukes  in  the  Kingdom  as  the  director  of  an  asso- 
ciation formed  for  the  purpose  of  defending  private 
property  in  land  that  was  especially  active  in  the 
recent  London  County  Council  election. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

"justice"  on  the  right  to  land. 

At  last,  however,  as  all  men  must,  even  after  the 
flying-machine  becomes  practicable,  Mr.  Spencer  is 
forced  to  come  down  from  light  and  air  to  solid 
earth. 

But  observe  how  reluctantly,  how  tenderly,  he 
approaches  the  main  question,  the  subject  he  would 
evidently  like  to  ignore  altogether.  Land  —  to  us 
the  one  solid,  natural  element ;  our  all-producing,  all- 
supporting  mother,  from  whose  bosom  our  very  frames 
are  drawn,  and  to  which  they  return  again ;  our  stand- 
ing-place ;  our  workshop ;  our  granary ;  our  reservoir 
and  substratum  and  nexus  of  media  and  forces ;  the 
element  from  whicli  all  we  can  produce  must  be 
drawn ;  without  which  we  cannot  breathe  the  air  or 
enjoy  the  light;  the  element  prerequisite  to  all  hu- 
man life  and  action  —  he  speaks  of  as  "  that  remain- 
ing portion  of  the  environment,  hardly  to  be  called  a 
medium,"  which  "6j/  an  unusual  extension  of  meaning''^ 
is  included  in  the  things  to  which  the  equal  liberty 
of  all  extends. 

Yet,  at  last,  and  thus  tenderly,  after  having  shown 
to  his  own  satisfaction  that  with  regard  to  personal 
rights  and  the  liberty  of  movement,  "  things  as  they 
are  "  in  such  countries  as  England  do  not  differ  from 
"  things  as  they  ouglit  to  be,"  except,  perhaps,  that 


."justice"  on  the  right  to  land,        203 

there  is  too  much  smoking  in  railway  carriages,  Mr. 
Spencer  does  at  last  get  to  the  burning  question  of 
the  land.  And  no  sooner  does  he  get  there  than  the 
power  by  virtue  of  which  a  truth  once  recognized 
can  never  be  entirely  forgotten  or  utterly  ignored, 
forces  from  him  this  recognition : 

If,  while  possessing  those  ethical  sentiments  which 
social  discipline  lias  now  produced,  men  stood  in  the  pos- 
session of  a  territory  not  yet  individually  portioned  out, 
tliey  would  no  more  hesitate  to  assert  equality  of  their 
claims  to  the  land  than  they  would  hesitate  to  assert 
equality  of  their  claims  to  light  and  air. 

"iT"'  ^^'^"'^^  possessing  those  etidcal  sentiments  which  so- 
cial discipline  has  note  produced.''^  This  "  if  "  is  the 
assumption  of  the  Spencerian  philosophy,  that  our 
moral  sentiments  have  been  evolved  by  pressure  of 
conditions,  survival  of  the  fittest  and  herethtary  trans- 
mission, since  the  time  when,  according  to  it,  primitive 
men  were  accustomed  to  eat  each  other.  Having  told 
us  that  social  evolution  has  l:)rought  mankind  in  the 
Victorian  era  to  the  recognition  of  equal  rights  to  air 
and  light,  Mr.  Spencer  now  assumes  that  the  idea  of 
equal  rights  to  the  use  of  land  is  the  product  of  a 
similar  development  instead  of  being  a  primary  per- 
ception of  mankind. 

Now  this  assumption  is  not  merely  opposed  to  all 
the  facts ;  it  is  inconsistent  with  the  Spencerian  phi- 
losophy. 

To  consider  the  philosophy  first:  It  holds  that  man 
is  an  evolution  from  the  animal.  He  comes  to  be 
man  by  gradual  development  from  the  monkey  or 
from  some  form  of  life  from  whicli  the  monkeys  have 
also    sprung.      In    the    coui'se    of    this    evolutionary 


204  RECANTATION. 

process,  continued  since  he  became  man,  lie  has  ac- 
quired his  present  instincts,  habits  and  powers. 

Now  I  will  not  ask  how,  since  the  highest  animals 
that  habitually  eat  their  own  kind  are  on  the  syn- 
thetic genealogical  tree  far  below  any  of  the  animals, 
existing  or  extinct,  from  which  man  can  have  de- 
scended, the  oft-repeated  assumption  that  primitive 
men  were  habitual  cannibals  can  be  reconciled  with 
the  assumption  that  they  derived  their  habits  from 
their  animal  ancestors. 

But  I  will  make  bold  to  ask  how  the  assumption 
that  men  have  only  now  arrived  at  the  perception  of 
the  equality  of  rights  to  the  use  of  the  natural  media, 
and  especially  land,  can  be  reconciled  with  the 
assumption  that  our  moral  perceptions  are  derived 
from  animals.  Animals  fight  with  their  own  kind, 
as  men  fight ;  or  at  least  some  of  them  do  occasion- 
ally, though  none  fight  so  frequently  and  so  wan- 
tonly. But  is  there  an  animal,  from  tlie  monkey  to 
the  jelly-fish,  that  does  not,  with  animals  of  its  own 
kind,  and  w^hen  at  peace,  fail  to  claim  for  itself  and 
accord  to  others  the  liberty  to  use  natural  media, 
bounded  onl}^  by  the  equal  liberty  of  all  ?  If  there 
is  not,  how  can  the  assumption  that  it  has  taken  man 
all  these  ages  to  recognize  the  equality  of  rights  to 
the  use  of  natural  media  be  made  to  harmonize  with 
the  assumption  that  he  primarily  derives  his  percep- 
tions from  the  animal  ? 

I  ask  this  question  to  emphasize  the  fact  that,  in 
his  effort  to  smooth  away  the  monstrous  injustice  of 
private  property  in  land,  Mr.  Spencer  does  violence 
to  his  own  theories  —  not  alone  to  the  theories  which 
he  held  when  he  wrote  "  Social  Statics,"  but  to  the 


"justice'"  on  the  right  to  land.       205 

theories  of  his  Synthetic  Philoso])hy  —  the  theories 
set  forth  in  '"'  Justice  ;  "  that  he  stands  ready  to  sacri- 
fice to  his  new  masters  not  only  his  moral  honesty,  but 
even  what  the  morally  depraved  often  cling  to  —  the 
pretence  of  intellectual  honesty.  In  order  to  ignore 
the  gist  of  the  land  question  while  pretending  to 
explain  it,  he  is  endeavoring  to  create  the  impression 
that  the  present  treatment  of  land,  if  not  indeed  the 
best,  is  at  least  the  highest  form  which  the  progressive 
development  of  the  idea  of  the  equality  of  rights  to 
the  use  of  natural  media  has  assumed.  But  to  say 
that  the  idea  of  equal  rights  to  land  is  the  product  of 
advancing  social  discipline  is  to  say  that  it  has  pro- 
ceeded from  the  contrary  idea  —  that  of  unequal 
rights,  or  private  property  in  land.  Since  the  ani- 
mals show  no  trace  of  this  idea,  this  assumption  is 
inconsistent  with  the  doctrine  that  primitive  man 
came  closest  to  the  animals.  And  to  assume,  as 
Mr.  Spencer  does  in  this  chapter,  that  men  start 
with  the  idea  of  unequal  rights  to  land,  and  have 
been  working  up  through  social  discipline  to  the 
idea  of  equal  rights,  is  likewise  inconsistent  with 
all  the  points  in  the  elaborate  derivation  of  the  idea 
of  justice,  which  occupy  the  first  eight  chapters  of 
this  very  book. 

The  assumption  that  the  idea  of  equal  rights  to 
land  is  the  product  of  social  discipline  is  at  both 
ends  contradicted  by  the  facts.  In  America,  Aus- 
tralia and  New  Zealand,  men  of  English  speech,  pos- 
sessing "those  ethical  sentiments  which  social  disci- 
pline has  now  produced,"  have  stood  in  possession  of 
tei-ritory  not  yet  individually  portioned  out:  but,  in- 
stead of   asserting    the  equality   of    claims   to   land, 


206  RECANTATION. 

they  have  proceeded  to  individually  portion  out  this 
territory  as  fast  as  they  could.  Thus  the  effect  upon 
their  ethical  sentiments  'of  the  social  discipline  to 
which  they  have  been  subjected  has  been  the  precise 
opposite  of  what  Mr.  Spencer  asserts.  Instead  of 
leading  them  from  non-perception  to  a  perception  of 
the  equality  of  rights  to  land,  social  discipline,  domi-. 
nated  by  land-owners,  and  continued  steadily  and  rig- 
orously, had,  within  comparatively  recent  times, 
almost  entirely  crushed  out  the  idea  of  natural  rights 
in  land  among  the  English  people,  and  taught  them 
to  look  on  private  property  in  land  as  in  nowise  dif- 
fering from  property  in  other  things. 

Or,  try  Mr.  Spencer's  assumption  from  the  other 
end. 

Among  the  aboriginal  races  in  the  countries  we 
modern  English  have  overrun,  the  idea  of  equal  rights 
to  land,  and  of  course  to  other  natural  media,  has 
been  so  clearly  perceived  that  they  were  unable  to 
comprehend  the  artificial  notion  of  private  property 
in  land  —  could  no  more  see  than  could  Mr.  Spencer 
in  1850  how  land  could  equitably  become  private 
property.  To  this  very  day,  and  in  spite  of  the 
pressure  of  the  national  government  and  of  the  sur- 
rounding whites,  the  Cherokees,  the  Choctaws,  and 
other  civilized  remnants  of  the  aboriginal  tribes  of 
the  United  States,  though  recognizing  fully  the  right 
of  property  in  things  produced  by  labor,  and  recog- 
nizing also  the  right  of  private  possession  of  land, 
refuse  to  recognize  land  as  the  property/  of  the 
individual ;  and  no  man  can  hold  land  among  them 
except  while  putting  it  to  use.  The  idea  that  land 
itself  can  become  subject  to  such  individual  owner- 


"justice"  on  the  eight  to  land.        207 

ship  as  attaches  to  things  that  man  produces  by  labor, 
is  as  repugnant  to  the  human  mind,  undisciplined 
by  generations  of  cruel  repression  and  undistorted 
by  persistent  misteachings,  as  the  idea  that  air  or 
sunlight  may  be  so  ov/ned. 

Mr.  Spencer  himself,  while  stating  that  the  per- 
ception of  the  equality  of  natural  rights  to  land 
is  the  product  of  the  social  advance  that  has 
broufjht  men  of  the  hiofhest  civilization  to  their 
present  ethical  condition,  goes  on  in  the  next  para- 
graph to  show  at  length  that  "  in  early  stages  private 
ownership  of  land  is  unknown,"  and  that  private 
property  in  land  has  arisen  from  "  the  exercise  of 
direct  or  indirect  force,  sometimes  internal  but  chiefly 
external."  ^ 

What  Mr.  Spencer  thus  admits  is  that  private  prop- 
erty in  land  has  no  derivation  from  perceptions  of 
justice,  whether  these  be  original  or  acquired  by 
evolution,  but  that  its  only  genesis  is  force.  And 
then  comes  his  supreme  effort.  In  the  reference  to 
the  feudal  system  and  the  assumption  that  the  rights 

^  It  may  be  worth  noting  that  here  Mr.  Spencer  again  confuses 
equal  rights  with  joint  rights.  The  primitive  idea  is  not  that  of 
(ioeuiing  land  the  property  of  the  tribe,  and  the  relations  of  individ- 
uals to  the  soil  one  of  joint  ownership.  Although  within  generally 
vague  territorial  limits  each  tribe  may  claim  the  right  to  exclude 
other  tribes,  yet  the  idea  is  not  that  of  property  in  the  land,  but  of 
that  sort  of  separation  which  took  place  between  Lot  and  Abraham ; 
and  the  relation  of  the  members  to  the  land  is  not  that  of  joint 
ownership,  but  of  equal  right  to  use  —  such  regulations  as  in  the 
earlier  stages  become  necessary,  being  merely  those  which  secure 
this  equality  in  use.  Among  no  primitive  people  would  it  be 
thought  that  a  member  of  the  tribe  required  the  consent  of  the 
whole  to  make  use  of  land  no  one  else  was  using.  He  would  do 
that  without  question,  as  a  matter  of  individual  right. 


208  RECANTATION. 

of  the  monarch,  as  representative  of  the  whole  people, 
are  still  exercised  by  the  people's  representatives,  lies 
the  pivotal  point  of  his  whole  argument. 

To  return  to  my  illustration  of  the  tunnel.  This 
is  the  way  he  gets  there : 

We  are  told  that  when  private  property  in  land  did 
arise,  it  was  habitually  incomplete,  since  it  was  sub- 
ject to  the  claims  of  the  over-loid,  the  implication 
being  that  the  ownership  was  subordinate  to  that  of 
the  head  of  the  community  ;  and  that  this  conception 
survives  alike  in  theory  and  in  practice  to  the  present 
time,  since  the  state  now  takes  land  for  public  pur- 
poses after  making  due  compensation  to  existing 
holders.  The  supreme  power  of  the  monarch  having 
been  replaced  by  the  supreme  power  of  the  people, 
the  people  are  now  the  supreme  owners  of  the  land, 
and  may  take  it,  if  they  please,  on  payment  of  full 
compensation.  Thus,  individual  freedom  has  been 
re-acquired  with  regard  to  land,  and  to-day,  in  the 
existing  theory  and  practice  of  English  law,  and  like 
tlieir  equal  rights  to  light  and  air,  the  equal  rights 
of  all  to  the  use  of  land  are  fully  recognized. 

All  that  has  gone  before  is  the  by -play  of  the  jug- 
gler to  distract  attention.  In  this  the  transmogrifi- 
cation is  worked. 

Here,  with  one  flash  of  synthetic  logic,  the  horse- 
chestnut  becomes  a  chestnut  horse !  Here  is  the 
explanation  of  what  was  averred  in  Mr.  Spencer's 
letter  to  the  Times  —  that  the  view  of  land-ownership 
he  has  taken  all  along  is  "  congruous  with  existing 
legal  theory  and  practice."  Here  is  his  reconciliation 
of  his  formula  of  justice — that  "-each  is  at  liberty 
to  do  all  that  he  wills,  jjrovided  that  he  infringes  not 


"justice"  on  the  right  to  land.       209 

the  equal  liberty  of  any  other  man  "  —  with  the  views 
of  that  august  body,  the  Land  and  Property  Defence 
League,  "on  whicli  sit  several  peers  and  two  judges." 
Both  are  harmonized  in  the  assumption  that  the  equal 
rights  of  all  to  the  use  of  land  are  to-day  recognized  in 
the  right  of  Parliament  to  take  land  for  public  pur- 
poses on  paying  for  it. 

What,  it  may  be  asked,  has  become  of  the  nine- 
teen-twentieths  of  the  people  of  England  who,  as 
"Social  Statics  "  told  us,  were  being  robbed  of  their 
birthright — their  heritage  in  the  earth  —  by  a  gigan- 
tic injustice  inferior  only  in  wickedness  to  murder 
and  enslavement?  Why,  having  the  privilege  of 
voting  for  members  of  one  branch  of  the  Legislature, 
which  Mr.  Spencer  has,  in  this  very  book,  page  49, 
described  as  "  a  motley  assemblage  of  nominees  of 
caucuses,  ruled  by  ignorant  and  fanatical  wire- 
pullers," they  have  been  transmogrified  into  supreme 
owners  of  the  land. 

What,  it  still  may  be  asked,  has  become  of  that 
part  of  them  that  do  not  have  even  the  poor  privilege 
of  voting  for  this  motley  assemblage  of  nominees  of 
caucuses  ? 

There  is  no  answer.  We  may  search  Chapter  IV. 
of  the  "  Principles  of  Ethics  —  The  Ethics  of  Social 
Life :  Justice,"  in  vain.  They  have  incontinently 
dropped  out  of  sight. 

It  may  be  worth  while  to  examine  that  part  of 
Mr.  Spencer's  logical  process  where  it  is  assumed 
that  the  legal  theory  and  practice  by  which  the 
British  Legislature,  on  the  payment  of  compensa- 
tion, now  takes  land  for  public  purposes  is  identical 


210  RECANTATION. 

with  the  theory  and  practice  by  which  the  feudal 
monarch,  as  representing  the  whole  people,  was  the 
supreme  owner  of  land.  This  is  all  that  he  ventures 
specifically  to  assert,  and  the  question  raised  by  it  is 
much  narrower  than  the  real  question,  whether  the 
present  legal  theory  and  practice  does  adequately 
recognize  the  equal  rights  of  all  to  land.  Yet,  even 
here,  Mr.  Spencer  clearly  suppresses  the  vital  fact. 

The  taking  of  land  for  public  purposes  on  payment 
of  compensation  —  or  by  process  of  condemnation, 
as  it  is  termed  —  is  neither  an  exercise  nor  recogni- 
tion of  the  supreme  ownership  of  land.  In  the 
American  States  where  the  ownership  of  land  is  by 
their  constitutions  declared  allodial,  the  same  powers 
of  condemning  laud  are  exerted,  and  more  freely 
exerted  than  in  England.  If  pictures  are  bought  for 
the  national  galleries,  not  condemned,  it  is  merely  be- 
cause there  is  no  need  for  condemnation.  The  same 
legal  power  exists  to  take  pictures  for  public  use  as 
to  take  land.  In  case  of  necessity,  such  as  war,  the 
power  of  taking  anything  is  habitually  exercised, 
and  ships,  horses,  railways,  provisions,  and  even  men 
are  taken  for  public  uses.  The  power  to  do  this  is  a 
power  incident  to  the  supreme  authority  and  at  times 
necessary  to  society. 

When,  in  1889,  Johnstown,  Pennsylvania,  was  cut 
off  from  the  rest  of  the  world  by  the  flood  that  de- 
stroyed pre-existing  organization,  a  British  subject, 
Arthur  J.  Moxham,  was  placed  in  charge  by  what  a 
Quaker  would  call  "  the  sense  of  the  meeting."  His 
first  acts  were  to  seize  all  food,  to  destroy  all  liquor, 
and  to  put  every  able-bodied  man  at  work,  leaving 
the  matter  of  compensation  to  be  determined  after- 


"  JUSTICE  "   ON  THE  EIGHT   TO   LAND.         211 

wards.  He  voiced  the  will  of  the  society,  driven  by 
crushing  disaster  into  a  supreme  effort  for  self-pres- 
ervation, and  the  man  who  had  resisted  his  orders 
would,  if  need  be,  have  been  shot. 

But  the  theory  of  English  law  that  the  crown  is 
the  only  owner  of  English  land,  and  that  the  highest 
estate  an  individual  can  hold  is  that  of  tenancy,  though 
often  confused  with  the  right  of  eminent  domain,  has 
in  reality  a  different  origin.  Now  a  mere  fiction,  it  had 
in  feudal  times  expression  in  practice.  When  William 
the  Conqueror  divided  England,  he  conditioned  his 
grants  on  the  payment  of  rent  in  dues  or  services. 
This  was  the  essence  of  the  feudal  principle.  In  a 
rough  and  partial  but  still  substantial  way,  it  recog- 
nized the  right  of  the  community  to  rent.  It  was  a 
rude  attempt  to  carry  out  that  system  of  land  nation- 
alization which  Mr.  Spencer  in  "  Social  Statics  "  de- 
clares the  only  equitable  system  of  land-tenure. 
Under  it  the  holding  of  valuable  land  entailed  pay- 
ment or  service.  The  crown  lands  maintained  the 
sovereign  and  the  civil  list.  From  the  church  lands 
the  expenses  of  public  worship,  and  of  education, 
the  care  of  the  sick  and  the  relief  of  wayfarers  were 
provided;  the  holders  of  military  tenures  had  to 
maintain  the  army  and  do  the  fighting,  and  on  occa- 
sions, such  as  the  ransom  of  the  king,  the  knighting 
of  his  eldest  son,  the  marriage  of  his  eldest  daughter, 
etc.,  were  called  on  for  extra  payments  ;  while  the 
right  of  all  Englishmen  to  the  use  of  some  portion 
at  least  of  English  soil  was  recognized  in  the  numer- 
ous public  commons.  This  spirit  of  the  feudal 
system  was  the  origin  of  primogeniture,  of  ward- 
ships and  liveries  and  other  feudal  incidents,  which, 


212  RECANTATION. 

where  they  remain  on  the  law-books  of  to-day  are  but 
meaninsfless  and  useless  survivals. 

Mr.  Spencer,  in  his  "glance  at  some  past  phases  of 
land-tenure,"  has  told  us  of  the  Sumatrans,  the  Don 
Cossacks,  the  Russians,  the  Suanetians,  and  the  Daho- 
means,  but  lie  has  failed  to  tell  us  how  we  of  the 
English  speech  have  lost  those  fragments  of  the 
equal  right  to  the  use  of  land  that  we  retained  long 
after  the  last  conquest  of  England.  I  do  not  charge 
him  with  ignorance.  If  he  does  not  tell  us,  it  is  not 
because  he  does  not  know,  for  "  Political  Institu- 
tion "  sliows  that  he  does  know.^  But  he  does  not 
tell  us,  because  the  facts  are  inconsistent  with  the 
juggle  by  which  he  is  trying  to  impose  on  the  reader. 
It  was  in  reality  by  a  gigantic  series  of  no-rent  declara- 
tions on  the  part  of  the  class  that  had  got  possession  of 
English  land  on  condition  of  paying  rent  for  it.  The 
crown  lands  were  given  away  by  profligate  sovereigns 
without  any  stipulation  of  return  in  rent  to  the  com- 
munity. Henry  VIII.  made  over  the  greater  part  of 
the  church  lands  to  his  favorites,  and  the  people  were 
robbed  of  the  services  and  benefits  that  they  had  re- 
ceived from  the  former  holders.  Finally,  by  act  of 
the  Long  Parliament,  confirmed  after  the  restoration 

1  In  the  chapter  on  Political  Differentiation,  page  297,  "  Prin- 
ciples of  Sociology,"  Volume  II.,  he  quotes  from  Ilallam:  — 

"  William  the  Conqueror  .  .  .  divided  this  kingdom  into  about 
00,000  parcels,  of  nearly  equal  value  [partly  left  in  the  hands  of 
those  who  previously  held  it,  and  partly  made  over  to  his  follow- 
ers as  either  owners  or  suzerains],  from  each  of  which  the  service 
of  a  soldier  was  due." 

And  again,  in  the  chapter  on  Property,  page  553  of  the  same 
book,  occurs  the  passage  once  before  quoted :  — 

In  our  case  the  definite  ending  of  these  tenures  took  place  in 
1G60;  when  for  feudal  obligations  (a  burden  on  land-owners)  was 
substituted  a  beer-excise  (a  burden  on  the  community). 


"justice"  on  the  right  to  land.        213 

by  a  close  majority,  the  military  dues  were  abolished; 
and,  growing  in  power  by  wliat  they  fed  on,  the  land- 
holders, now  actually  land-owners,  appropriated  to 
themselves,  by  the  simple  process  of  inclosure,  nearly 
all  tlie  common  lands. 

The  essence  and  meaning  of  the  supreme  owner- 
ship of  the  land  of  England  by  the  crown  is  thus 
gone.  What  remains  is  but  a  legal  fiction,  a  mere 
survival  of  form,  of  no  more  validity  than  was  in 
the  time  of  George  III.  the  form  by  which  he  styled 
himself  King  of  France.  Yet  in  this  empty  phrase, 
and  in  the  taking  of  land  for  public  use  on  payment 
of  full  compensation,  Mr.  Spencer  tells  his  disinher- 
ited countrymen  that  their  equal  rights  are  actually 
recognized. 

Thus  the  equal  right  of  Englishmen  to  the  use  of 
English  land  amounts  to  the  privilege  of  buying  it 
at  its  full  value !  What,  then,  has  the  Englishman  as 
Englishman?  A  Russian  or  a  Turk,  a  Winans  or  a 
Carnegie,  may  use  land  in  England  by  paying  for  it. 

If  we  put  the  conclusion  as  to  the  right  to  the  use  of 
land  to  which  Mr.  Spencer  thus  comes  in  "  Justice  " 
in  the  same  form  which  he  uses  in  "  Social  Statics,"  we 
have  this : 

Given  a  race  of  beings  having  like  claims  to  pursue 
the  objects  of  their  desires  —  given  a  world  adapted 
to  the  gratification  of  those  desires  —  a  world  into 
which  such  beings  are  similarly  born,  and  it  unavoid- 
ably follows  that  they  have  the  right  to  use  this 
world  as  soon  as  they  have  paid  the  full  value  of  it 
to  those  of  their  number  who  call  themselves  its 
owners. 

But  this  telling  the  disinherited  masses  that  their 
equal  rights  to  land  are  already  acknowledged  seems 


214  EECANTATION. 

hardly  satisfactory  to  Mr.  Spencer  himself,  for  he  at 
once  proceeds  to  re-enforce  it,  by  the  plea  that  for 
them  to  claim  any  more  than  the  right  of  buying 
land  at  its  full  value  would  be  etliically  wrong. 
This  is  a  putting  of  the  cart  before  the  horse.  For 
a  wrong  is  only  tlie  violation  of  a  right.  Rights,  as 
Mr.  Spencer  has  just  before  told  us,  are  the  particular 
freedoms  deducible  from  the  law  of  equal  freedom, 
and  to  assert  wrong  he  must  show  violation  of  that 
law.  Let  us,  however,  follow  his  reasoning. 
The  first  proposition  is  that  — 

Since  equity  and  daily  custom  alike  imply  that  exist- 
ing liolders  of  particular  portions  of  land  may  not  be 
dispossessed  without  giving  them  in  return  its  fairly 
estimated  value,  it  is  also  implied  that  the  wholesale 
resumption  of  the  land  by  the  community  can  be  justly 
effected  only  by  the  wholesale  purchase  of  it. 

Is  it?  By  equity  and  custom  when  the  state 
takes  any  part  of  the  wealth  of  a  particular  person 
it  compensates  him.  But  when  it  takes  part  of  the 
wealth  of  all  persons,  or  of  all  persons  of  a  special 
class,  as  it  is  constantly  doing  by  taxation,  does  it 
compensate  them  ? 

The  reason  for  compensation,  when  land  is  taken 
from  particular  owners,  is  tliat  otherwise  a  discrim- 
ination would  be  made  between  them  and  other  land- 
owners. Equity,  as  Mr.  Spencer  once  told  us,  means 
equalness.  It  would  not  be  equitable  for  the  com- 
munity to  resume  possession  of  the  land  of  this  or 
that  particular  land-owner  without  compensation, 
while  leaving  to  other  land-owners  their  land,  for 
while  this  would  be  to  leave  unredressed  the  unequal- 
ness  between  land-holders  and  others,  it  would  be  to 


"justice"    on   the   lUGllT   TO   LAND.  215 

treat  land-owners  unequally  as  between  themselves. 
But  if  all  land  were  resumed  equity  would  require 
no  compensation,  for  while  land-owners  would  be 
treated  equally  as  between  themselves,  the  inequality 
between  them  and  other  members  of  the  community 
would  be  removed,  and  all  would  be  treated  with 
equalness.  And  since  they,  too,  are  members  of  the 
community,  the  resumption  of  all  land  by  the  com- 
munity would  place  all  in  a  condition  of  equalness 
with  respect  to  the  land. 

But,  continues  Mr.  Spencer  —  herein  admitting  that 
the  community  may  in  equity  take  the  land  — 

Were  the  direct  exercise  of  ownership  to  be  resumed 
by  the  comunmity  without  purchase,  the  comiuunity 
would  take,  along  with  something  which  is  its  own,  an 
immensely  greater  amount  of  something  which  is  not 
its  own. 

How  so  ?  The  proposition  is  only  to  take  the  land, 
not  to  take  anything  else. 

Because,  Mr.  Spencer  continues  — 

Even  if  we  ignore  those  multitudinous  complications 
which,  in  the  course  of  century  after  century,  have 
inextricably  entangled  men's  claims  theoretically  con- 
sidered —  even  if  we  reduce  the  case  to  its  simplest 
theoretical  form  — 

Well,  all  classes  of  land  resumptionists  would 
quickly  reply,  we  are  quite  willing  to  do  so.  Since, 
as  laid  down  in  "  Social  Statics,"  men  derive  their 
equal  riglits  to  the  tise  of  the  world,  from  their 
equal  presence  in  the  world,  there  can  be  no  compli- 
cations that  can  entangle  their  equal  claims  to  the 
use  of  land,  either  considered  theoretically  or  in  any 
other  way. 


216  RECANTATION. 

But  without  heeding  this,  Mr.  Spencer  goes  on 
to  say,  that  even  if  we  ignore  what  no  one  proposes  to 
consider,  and  even  if  we  reduce  the  case  to  simple 
theoretical  form  — 

We  must  admit  that  all  which  can  be  claimed  for  the 
community  is  the  surface  of  the  country  in  its  original 
unsubdued  state.  To  all  that  value  given  to  it  by  clear- 
ing, breaking-up,  prolonged  culture,  fencing,  draining, 
making  roads,  farm-buildings,  etc.,  constituting  nearly 
all  its  value,  the  community  has  no  claim.  This  value 
has  been  given  either  by  personal  labor,  or  by  labor  paid 
for,  or  by  ancestral  labor ;  or  else  the  value  given  to  it 
in  such  ways  has  been  purchased  by  legitimately  earned 
money.  All  this  value  artificially  given  vests  in  exist- 
ing owners,  and  cannot  without  a  gigantic  robbery  be 
taken  from  them.  If,  during  the  many  transactions 
which  have  brought  about  existing  land-ownership,  there 
have  been  much  violence  and  much  fraud,  these  have 
been  small  compared  with  the  violence  and  the  fraud 
which  the  community  would  be  guilty  of  did  it  take 
possession,  without  paying  for  it,  of  that  artificial  value 
which  the  labor  of  nearly  two  thousand  years  has  given 
to  the  land. 

What  does  Mr.  Spencer  mean  ?  If  he  means  that 
all  that  can  be  claimed  by  the  community  is  the 
land  itself,  and  that  land-owners  should  retain  the 
value  of  their  improvements,  and  of  all  things  else 
that  they  may  possess,  we  admit  it — not  entirely  as 
a  matter  of  strict  justice,  for  much  of  things  other 
than  the  land  itself,  which  existing  land-owners 
now  possess,  they  have  obtained  by  their  unjust 
appropriation  of  land.  But  we  wish  to  be  within 
our  right,  and  to  let  bygones  be  bygones,  and  so  all 
that  we  propose  is  just  what  Mr.  Spencer  in  "  Social 
Statics  "  proposed — the  resumption  of  equal  rights 
in  land,  leaving   to   existing    land-owners,  without 


"justice"   on   the   IllGHT   TO   LAND.  217 

question  as  to  how  it  was  obtained,  the  whole  value 
of  their  improvements  in  or  on  land,  and  all  their 
other  property. 

But  what,  then,  does  Mr.  Spencer  mean  by  talking 
of  "  the  surface  of  the  country  in  its  original  unsub- 
dued state,"  as  all  the  connnnuity  can  claim?  What 
does  he  mean  by  talking  of  that  "artificial  value 
which  the  labor  of  nearly  two  thousand  years  has 
given  to  the  land?"  Vague  as  are  his  notions  of 
value,  can  it  be  that  he  means  that,  even  if  their 
natural  rights  are  admitted,  the  people  of  England 
are  only  entitled  to  what  value  the  land  had  before 
there  were  any  people  ?  and  that  they  must  pay  the 
land-owners  for  the  value  of  all  the  labor  that  has  been 
expended  on  that  land  since  Caesar  landed? 

What  the  people  of  England  are  entitled  to  by 
natural  right,  and  what  we  propose  by  the  single  tax 
to  take  for  their  use,  is  the  value  of  land  as  it  is,  ex- 
clusive of  the  value  of  improvements  as  they  are  in 
or  on  the  land  privately  owned.  What  would  thus 
be  left  to  the  land-owners  would  be  their  personal  or 
movable  property,  the  value  of  all  existing  improve- 
ments in  or  on  their  land,  and  their  equal  share  with 
all  other  citizens  in  the  land  value  resumed.  This  is 
perfectly  clear,  and  if  not  perfectly  fair,  is  only  so 
because  it  would  leave  to  the  land-owners  in  their  per- 
sonal property  and  the  value  of  their  improvements 
much  not  due  to  any  exertion  of  labor  by  themselves 
or  their  ancestors,  but  which  has  come  to  them  through 
the  unjust  appropriation  of  the  proceeds  of  others' 
labor. 

The  value  of  the  land  when  the  country  was  in  its 
original  unsubdued  state  has  nothing  to  do  with  the 


218  llECANTATiON. 

matter;  what  we  have  to  deal  with  is  the  value  of 
the  land  as  it  is.  Nor  has  the  labor  expended  since 
Caesar's  time  anything  to  do  with  it;  the  value  of  im- 
provements to  be  left  to  land-owners  is  the  value  of 
existirg  improvements.  Surely  if  Mr.  Spencer  were 
to  try  to  formulate  his  notions  it  would  be  too  prepos- 
terous even  for  him  to  contend  that  in  resuming  our 
rights  in  the  land  —  not  the  rights  of  the  ancient 
Britons,  nor  the  rights  of  primitive  man,  nor  the  rights 
of  the  animals  that  existed  before  man  was  —  we 
sliould  credit  the  existing  land-owners  with  the  value 
which  attaches  to  the  land  from  our  presence,  and 
charge  them  only  with  what  value  the  land  might 
have  if  we  did  not  exist.  And  surely  he  would  not 
contend  that  the  land-owners  are  alone  entitled  to  the 
value  which  the  existing  social  environment  gives  to 
land  —  to  the  sole  benefit  of  the  introduction  of  Chris- 
tianity, the  extirpation  of  wolves,  the  beating  off  or 
civilizing  of  the  Danes,  the  defeat  of  the  Spanish 
armada,  the  building  of  public  roads  and  the  lighting 
of  public  streets,  the  introduction  of  vegetables  and 
fruits  and  the  improvement  of  domestic  animals,  the 
utilization  of  steam  and  electricity  and  labor-saving 
appliances,  the  discoveries  of  science  and  the  progress 
of  the  arts ! 

Nor  yet  would  he  formally  assert  the  notion  that 
in  addition  to  the  present  value  of  their  improvements 
the  land-owners  must  be  credited  with  the  value  of  all 
such  improvements  when  they  were  new,  and  with 
the  cost  of  all  the  draining,  hedging,  fencing,  digging, 
manuring,  building,  etc.,  that  has  gone  on  for  two 
thousand  years  —  that  the  owner  of  land  in  the  city 
of  London,  for  instance,  must  be  credited,  not  only 


"justice"  on  the  eight  to  land.   219 

with  the  present  value  of  his  houses,  but  with  the 
value  of  the  houses  that  existed  before  the  great  fire, 
and  from  the  time  of  the  first  Roman  camp !  This 
would  be  equally  preposterous. 

It  is  hard  to  say  what  Mr.  Spencer  really  does 
mean.  But  he  is  evidently  trying  to  get  some  sort 
of  vague  excuse  for  assuming  that  it  would  not  pay 
the  disinherited  to  claim  their  rights  in  land,  since 
to  compensate  land-owners  would  take  more  than  the 
land  is  worth.  Let  us,  therefore,  try  to  form  some 
idea  of  what  would  be  the  present  value  of  the  land 
of  England  in  its  "  original,  unsubdued  state,"  popu- 
lation and  social  environment,  and  the  existing  build- 
ings, which  we  propose  to  leave  to  the  land-owners, 
remaining  as  they  are. 

If,  whenever  a  house  was  pulled  down,  or  destroyed 
by  fu"e,  in  Threadneedle  street  or  Lombard  street,  in 
Cheapside  or  at  Charing  Cross,  the  ground  on  which 
it  stood  were  to  spring  into  its  original  condition, 
how  much  less  would  be  its  value  to  those  who,  in 
renting  or  buying  it,  seek  not  so  much  soil  or  rock 
or  sand,  but  so  many  square  feet  of  standing-place 
in  those  centres  of  population  and  trade  ?  How  much 
less  would  be  the  value  of  the  land  that  around 
London  and  Manchester  and  Liverpool  and  Birming- 
ham and  Leeds  and  all  the  growing  English  towns 
is  being  turned  from  agricultural  uses  into  house- 
sites,  were  it  to  revert  to  its  condition  in  Roman 
times  ?  While  as  for  the  country  outside  the  cities 
and  towns,  would  it  not,  could  such  a  miracle  be 
worked,  become  more  rather  than  less  valuable  ? 
Something  of  draining,  hedging,  walling,  manuring 
and  digging  would  be  lost ;   but  would  not  the  ac- 


220  RECANTATION. 

cumulated  richness  of  virgin  soil,  the  great  forests 
that  in  England  now  would  have  enormous  value, 
the  stores  of  coal  and  iron  and  other  minerals  that 
have  now  been  exhausted  or  can  only  be  worked  at 
great  de2>ths,  much  more  than  make  up? 

If  Mr.  Spencer  would  go  to  the  greater  Englands 
growing  up  in  Australia  and  the  American  West, 
he  would  cease  thinking  of  Romans,  or'  Saxons  or 
Normans  as  having  anything  to  do  with  the  present 
value  of  English  land ;  for  he  would  see  that  it  is  not 
what  has  been  done  in  the  past,  but  the  population 
and  activity  of  the  present,  that  give  value  to  land. 
He  would  see  from  Chicago  or  Johnstown  that  Lon- 
don might  be  swept  by  fire  or  flood,  and  yet,  if  the 
causes  that  concentrate  population  and  trade  there 
still  remained,  land,  instead  of  being  less  valuable, 
would  really  become  more  valuable,  from  the  better 
improvements  that  the  clearing  M'ould  bring  about. 
He  would  see  that,  if  the  population  and  business  of 
London  could  be  transported  to  a  newly-risen  island 
in  the  antipodes,  land  there  Avould  become  as  valuable 
as  land  in  London  now ;  and  that,  though  all  improve- 
ments were  to  be  left  behind,  the  value  of  land  in 
London  would  disappear. 

What  the  new  countries  will  show  us  is,  that  as 
man  lives  in  the  present  so  he  lives  hy  the  labor  of 
the  present  and  tlie  immediate  past,  truly  from  hand 
to  mouth  ;  and  what  we  get  from  our  ancestors  is 
little  more  than  language,  traditions,  laws,  habits, 
and  the  store  of  transmitted  knowledge,  including 
also  prejudices  and  superstitions.  And  thus  rich  and 
poor,  learned  and  ignorant,  we  are  alike  "the  heirs  of 
all  the  ages."     While  if  some  of  us  are  richer  than 


"justice"  on  the  right  to  land.       221 

we  ought  t(j  Lo,  and  more  of  us  are  poorer  than  we 
ought  to  be,  it  is  not  because  of  the  wrongful  appro- 
priations of  wealth  that  took  place  in  a  dead  and 
gone  past,  but  from  the  wrongful  appropriations  of 
wealth  that  are  taking  place  now. 

Barring  the  appendix,  which  is  yet  to  be  considered, 
we  have  now  gone  through  Mr.  Spencer's  defence  of 
existing  landlordism  —  his  answer,  in  his  maturest 
years,  to  the  arraignment  of  private  property  in 
land  which  he  made  in  "  Social  Statics."  Stripped  of 
its  padding  it  amounts  simply  to  the  assumption 
(1)  that  the  equal  rights  of  all  to  the  use  of  land  are 
recognized  in  the  right  of  the  state  to  take  land  for 
public  purposes  on  paying  compensation  ;  which  is 
backed  by  the  assumption  (2)  that  equity  requires 
that  existing  owners  shall  be  paid  the  full  value  of 
the  land  they  hold  before  equal  rights  to  land  can  be 
acknowledged. 

Of  the  first  assumption,  the  only  attempt  at  sup- 
port is  in  the  last  paragraph,  the  reasoning  of  which 
on  analysis  will  be  found  to  be  this : 

The  equal  right  of  all  electors  to  the  use  of  land 
is  recognized  by  implication  in  the  right  asserted  by 
Parliament  to  take  land  for  public  use  on  paying 
full  compensation  for  its  value  ;  because  — 

If  it  is  not,  there  is  no  equitable  warrant  for  the 
state  so  taking  land  for  public  uses,  since  the  only 
right  by  which  the  land-owners  can  be  superseded  is 
the  right  of  the  community  at  large  :  hence  — 

As  the  state  has  this  right,  which  it  can  only  get 
as  the  sum  of  the  individual  rights  of  its  members ; 
therefore^  by   its   exercise,   the   individual  rights  of 


222  RECANTATION. 

members  of  the  state  to  the  use  of  land  are  now 
recognized. 

Of  the  second  assumption,  the  only  attempt  at  sup- 
port is  another  obviously  false  assumption  —  that  the 
value  of  land  cannot  be  distinguished  from  the  value 
of  improvements. 

This  is  the  argument  of  the  lauded  Synthetic 
Philosophy  in  the  most  important  part  of  the  most 
important  book  of  its  most  important  sub-division. 

I  commend  the  study  of  such  logical  processes  to 
those  who  on  authority  of  Herbert  Spencer's  phi- 
losoj)hy  believe  that  man  is  an  evoluted  monkey, 
who  got  the  idea  of  God  from  observing  his  own 
shadow. 

As  for  anything  deserving  the  name  of  reasoning, 
anything  on  which  may  be  founded  either  a  denial  of 
the  equal  right  of  all  to  the  use  of  land,  or  an  affir- 
mation of  the  exclusive  right  of  existing  land-owners, 
there  is  nothing  whatever.  It  is  not  merely  that  the 
reasoning  of  "Social  Statics"  is  not  impugned:  it  is 
that  the  reasoning  of  "Justice"  itself  is  utterly  ig- 
nored. No  connection  whatever  is  made  between  the 
conclusions  here  assumed  and  the  formula  of  justice, 
the  law  of  equal  freedom,  which  in  preceding  chapters 
of  this  very  book  has  been  declared  the  ultimate 
ethical  principle. 

The  reader  has  just  been  told  that  rights  are  the 
particular  freedoms  deducible  from  the  law  of  equal 
freedom ;  that  what  are  truly  called  rights  are  dedu- 
cible from  it,  and  that  what  are  falsely  called  rights  are 
not  deducible  from  it.  But  where  does  Mr.  Spencer, 
or  how  can  he,  deduce  the  right  which  he  asserts  for 
land-owners,  the  right  to  the  exclusive  use  of  land 


"jtJSTICE"   ON   THE  RIGHT   TO   LAND.  223 

until  they  are  paid  its  full  value,  from  the  law  of 
equal  freedom?  Or,  if  we  go  back  through  all  the 
links  of  his  derivation  of  the  formula  of  justice  can 
we  find  any  connection  between  what  he  now  asserts 
as  right,  and  what  he  has  just  asserted  as  justice  in 
any  of  its  evolutionary  stages? 

Does  not  the  ownership  by  some  to  the  exclusion 
of  others,  of  elements  essential  to  all  life,  the  legal 
giving  of  the  products  of  labor  to  those  who  do  no 
labor,  by  taking  it  away  from  those  who  do  labor, 
violate  what  he  declares  to  be  the  prinv^iple  of  animal 
ethics  —  that  the  ill-fitted  must  suffer  the  evils  of 
unfitness,  and  the  well-fitted  prove  their  fitness? 

Does  it  not  violate  what  he  declares  to  be  the  prin- 
ciple of  sub-human  justice,  that  each  individual  shall 
receive  the  benefits  and  evils  of  its  own  nature  and 
consequent  conduct? 

Does  it  not  violate  what  he  declares  to  be  the 
principle  of  human  justice,  that  no  one  should  be 
prevented  from  having  whatever  good  his  actions 
normally  bring  to  him,  nor  allowed  to  shoulder  off 
on  other  persons  whatever  evil  they  bring? 

Does  it  not  violate  what  he  declares  to  be  the  sen- 
timent of  justice,  the  feeling  that  we  ourselves  ought 
to  have  freedom  to  receive  the  results  of  our  own 
nature  and  consequent  actions,  and  which  prompts 
the  maintenance  of  this  sphere  of  free  play  for 
others  ? 

Does  it  not  violate  what  he  declares  to  be  the  idea 
of  justice,  the  equality  as  to  mutually  limited  spheres 
of  action,  the  inequality  in  the  results  which  each 
may  achieve  within  these  mutual  limits?  Does  it 
not  establish  inequality  by  authority  —  an  inequality 


224  RECANTATION. 

referring  not  to  the  natural  achievement  of  greater 
rewards  by  greater  merits,  but  to  the  artificial  appor- 
tionment of  rewards  to  no  merits  at  all? 

Does  it  not  violate  what  he  declares  to  be  the  for- 
mula of  justice,  that  every  man  is  free  to  do  that 
which  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal 
freedom  of  any  other  man? 

Does  it  not  set  at  defiance  what  he  declares  to  be 
the  authority  of  tliis  formula,  the  relation  between 
conduct  and  consequence,  which  he  bases  on  his  com- 
pound law? 

Private  property  in  land,  which  Herbert  Spencer  in 
"Justice"  defends  by  the  darkening  of  counsel  and 
baseless  assumptions !  Does  it  not  openly,  notori- 
ously, flagrantly,  deny  to  men  the  equal  use  of  nat- 
ural opportunities  to  live  their  lives,  develop  their 
powers,  and  reap  the  rewards  of  their  conduct?  Does 
it  not  give  to  the  idle,  the  stupid,  the  profligate,  the 
vicious,  through  the  accidents  of  birth  or  luck,  or 
successful  forestalling,  the  natural  rewards  of  indus- 
try, energy,  temperance  and  thrift?  Does  it  not  pro- 
portionately, and  far  more  than  proportionately  (for 
it  involves  enormous  wastes),  deny  these  rewards  to 
those  who  have  really  earned  them?  Does  it  not 
give  wealth,  honor,  the  command  of  everything  that 
labor  in  a  high  civilization  can  produce,  to  idlers, 
idiots,  gamesters,  profligates?  Does  it  not,  on  the 
other  hand,  condemn  toil  to  penury,  and  honest  labor, 
to  contempt  and  grinding  want?  Does  it  not, 
wherever  our  civilization  extends,  make  the  mere  op- 
portunity to  work  a  boon?  keep  men  in  idleness  whose 
strongest  desire  is  to  earn  a  living?  till  prisons  and 
almshouses?  condemn  to  ignorance  minds  that  might 


"justice"  on  the  eight  to  land.       225 

enlighten  and  bless  mankind?,  debase  and  embrute 
great  masses  of  men  and  women?  rob  little  children 
of  the  grace  and  sweetness  and  glory  of  life,  and 
force  them  before  their  time  out  of  a  world  in  which 
monopoly  denies  them  room  ? 

Try  Herbert  Spencer  by  the  ideas  that  he  once 
held  —  the  idea  of  a  Living  God,  whose  creatures  we 
are,  and  the  idea  of  a  divine  order,  to  which  we  are 
bound  to  conform.  Or  try  him  by  what  he  now  pro- 
fesses—  the  idea  that  we  are  but  the  evolutionary 
results  of  the  integrations  of  matter  and  motion. 
Try  him  by  the  principles  of  "  Social  Statics,"  or 
try  him  by  the  principles  of  "  Justice."  In  this  chap- 
ter he  proves  himself  alike  a  traitor  to  all  that  he 
once  held  and  to  all  that  he  now  holds  —  a  conscious 
and  deliberate  traitor,  who  assumes  the  place  of  the 
philosopher,  the  office  of  the  judge,  only  to  darken 
truth  and  to  deny  justice ;  to  sell  out  the  right  of  the 
wronged  and  to  prostitute  his  powers  in  the  defence 
of  the  wronger. 

Is  it  a  wonder  that  intellectually,  as  morally,  this 
chapter  is  beneath  contempt? 


CHAPTER  IX. 

"JTJSTICE."  —  THE  EIGHT   OF   PEOPERTY. 

In  "  Justice  "  as  in  "  Social  Statics,"  the  chapter 
on  the  right  to  land  is  followed  by  a  chapter  on  the 
right  of  property.  That  in  "  Social  Statics  "  I  have 
reprinted  in  full,  to  meet  Mr.  Spencer's  subsequent 
assertion  that  it  modified  the  radical  conclusions  of 
the  preceding  chapter.  But  it  is  hardly  necessary 
thus  to  treat  the  similar  chapter  of  "  Justice."  It 
begins  (Section  54) : 

Since  all  material  objects  capable  of  being  owned  are 
in  one  way  or  other  obtained  from  the  earth,  it  results 
that  the  right  of  property  is  originally  dependent  on  the 
right  to  the  use  of  the  earth.  While  there  were  yet  no 
artificial  products,  and  natural  products  were  therefore 
the  only  things  which  could  be  appropriated,  this  was 
an  obviously  necessary  connection.  And  though,  in  our 
developed  form  of  society,  there  are  multitudinous  pos- 
sessions, ranging  from  houses,  furniture,  clothes,  works 
of  art,  to  bank-notes,  railway-shares,  mortgages,  govern- 
ment bonds,  etc.,  the  origins  of  which  have  no  mani- 
fest relation  to  use  of  the  earth ;  yet  it  needs  but  to 
remember  that  they  either  are,  or  represent,  products  of 
labor,  that  labor  is  made  possible  by  food,  and  that  food 
is  obtained  from  the  soil,  to  see  that  the  connection, 
though  remote  and  entangled,  still  continues.  Whence 
it  follows  that  a  complete  ethical  justification  for  the 
right  of  property  is  involved  in  the  same  difficulties  as 
the  ethical  justification  for  the  right  to  the  use  of  the 
earth. 

Since  all  material  things  capable  of  being  owned 
consist  either  of  land  or  products  of  land,  the  round- 


*' JUSTICE." — THE   RIGHT   OF   PROPERTY.      227 

about  connection  between  such  things  as  are  here 
specified  and  the  earth,  through  the  food  consumed 
by  laborers,  is  a  queer  one,  which  indicates  what  in 
some  parts  of  "Social  Statics"  may  be  suspected, 
that  in  speaking  of  land  Mr.  Spencer,  as  is  often  the 
case  with  English  writers,  is  really  thinking  only  of 
agricultural  land. 

The  difficulties  of  which  he  speaks  are  the  diffi- 
culties he  raises  in  "  Social  Statics,"  by  confounding 
equal  rights  with  joint  rights,  and  he  here  again 
takes  issue  with  Locke  and  assumes,  as  before,  that  for 
production  to  give  title,  the  right  of  the  producer  to 
the  use  of  material  must  be  shown  to  be  "greater 
than  the  pre-existing  rights  of  all  other  men  put  to- 
gether." The  forty-one  years  that  have  elapsed  have 
left  Mr.  Spencer  still  entangled  by  this  self-raised 
difficulty.  But  he  now  goes  on  to  say  that  the  dif- 
ficulty arising  from  the  question  whether  by  labor 
"a  man  has  made  his  right  to  the  thing  greater 
than  the  pre-existing  rights  of  all  other  men  put  to- 
gether ^  .  .  .  may  be  avoided  however.  There  are 
three  ways  in  which,  under  savage,  semi-civilized, 
and  civilized  conditions,  men's  several  rights  of 
property  may  be  established  with  due  regard  to  the 
equal  rights  of  all  other  men." 

^  Mr.  Spencer  speaks  of  such  usages  as  that  an  unsuccessful 
hunter  in  passing  miglit  take  a  deer  from  a  trap  for  food,  leaving 
head,  skin,  and  saddle  for  the  owner,  as  implying  the  belief  of  the 
tribesmen  that  "  this  prey  was  in  part  theirs  before  it  was  killed." 
But  it  no  more  implies  tliis  than  the  custom  by  which,  among  the 
early  California  rancheros,  any  traveller  might  catch  a  fresh  horse, 
transfer  liis  saddle  and  leave  the  tired  one  implied  common  prop- 
erty in  horses,  or  than  the  kindly  customs  of  essentially  the  same 
kind  that  are  to  be  found  wherever  the  struggle  for  existence  that 
has  developed  with  our  civilization  has  not  become  intense. 


228  RECANTATION.  '' 

In  the  savage  condition,  lie  says  there  is  a  tacit 
agreement  that  having  equal  opportunities  of  utiliz- 
ing such  products,  appropriation  achieved  by  one 
shall  be  passively  assented  to  by  the  others. 

As  to  the  semi-civilized  condition,  he  says : 

We  meet  with  usages  having  the  same  general  impli- 
cations. ...  It  is  perceived  that  the  assent  of  the  clan 
to  ownership  of  food  grown  on  an  appropriated  portion 
by  any  one,  is  implied  in  the  assumptions  of  kindred 
ownership  similarly  established  by  all  others.  ...  In 
this  case  then  as  in  the  first,  the  right  of  property  arises 
in  conformity  with  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

So  far  then  Mr.  Spencer  derives,  and  properly  de- 
rives, the  right  of  property  from  the  exertion  of  labor 
under  conditions  in  which  all  are  equally  free  to 
make  use  of  land.  He  now  comes  to  his  third  divis- 
ion, where  he  is  to  show  how  in  civilized  conditions 
the  right  of  property  "  may  be  established  with  due 
regard  to  the  equal  rights  of  all  other  men."  I  will 
quote  this  in  full : 

Though  we  cannot  say  that  ownership  of  property,  thus 
arising,  results  from  actual  contract  between  each  mem- 
ber of  the  community  and  the  community  as  a  whole,  yet 
there  is  sometliing  like  a  potential  contract ;  and  such 
potential  contract  might  grow  into  an  actual  contract  if 
one  part  of  the  community  devoted  itself  to  other  occu- 
pations, while  the  rest  continued  to  farm :  a  share  of  the 
produce  being  in  such  case  payable  b}'^  agreement  to  those 
who  had  ceased  to  be  farmers,  for  the  use  of  their  sliares 
of  the  land.-^  We  have  no  evidence  that  such  a  relation 
between  occupiers  and  the  community,  with  consequent 

1  Here  is  another  instance  of  the  habit  of  thinking  of  land  as 
only  agricultural  land.  The  assumption  here  is  that  farmers  are 
the  only  users  of  land,  whereas  the  obvious  truth  is  that  there  is 
no  occupation  that  can  be  carried  on  without  the  use  of  land,  and 
that  many  other  occupations  require  the  use  of  much  more  valuable 


"JUSTICE."  —  THE   RIGHT   OF   TllOrERTY.      229 

authorized  rights  of  property  in  the  produce  whicli  re- 
mained after  payment  of  a  portion  equivalent  to  rent, 
has  ever  arisen ;  for,  as  we  have  seen,  the  original  owner- 
ship by  the  community  has  habitually  been  usurped  by 
internal  or  external  aggressors,  and  the  rent,  taking  the 
shape,  if  not  of  produce,  then  of  labor  or  military  ser- 
vice, has  been  habitually  paid  to  the  usurper,  a  state  of 
things  under  which  equitable  rights  of  property,  in  com- 
mon with  equitable  rights  of  all  kinds,  are  submerged. 
But  out  of  such  usurpations  there  has  grown  up,  as  we 
have  seen,  ownership  by  the  state  and  tenancy  under  it ; 
from  which  there  may  again  arise  a  theoretically  equitable 
right  of  property.  In  China,  where  "  the  land  is  all  held 
directly  from  the  Crown  "  "  on  payment  of  an  annual 
tax,"  "  with  composition  for  personal  service  to  the  gov- 
ernment," the  legitimate  proprietorship  of  such  produce 
as  remains  after  payment  of  rent  to  the  community,  can 
be  asserted  only  on  the  assumption  that  the  emperor 
stands  for  the  community.  In  India,  where  the  govern- 
ment is  supreme  land-owner,  and  where,  until  the  zemin- 
dar system  was  established,  it  was  the  direct  receiver  of 
rents,  the  derivation  of  a  right  of  property  by  contract 
between  the  individual  and  the  community  can  be  still 
less  asserted  without  a  strained  interpretation.  Nor  at 
home,  where  the  theory  that  each  land-owner  is  a  tenant 
of  the  crown  is  little  more  than  a  theory,  is  there  any 
better  fulfilment  of  the  ethical  requirement.  Only  here 
and  there,  where  state-ownership  is  not  potential  but 
actual,  and  ordinary  rents  are  paid  by  occupiers  to  the 
Crown  (which  has  now  in  such  cases  come  to  be  identi- 
fied with  the  community),  has  there  been  consequently 
established  that  kind  of  use  of  the  earth  which  gives  a 
theoretically  valid  basis  to  the  right  of  private  property. 

Now  what  is  it  that  Mr.  Spencer  here  sa3^s  ?  It  is 
that  a  theoretically  equitable  right  of  property  does 
not  now  exist  in  civilized  conditions  ;  but  that  it  may 
arise  if  the  now  nominal  and  potential  supreme  owht, 

land  than  does  farming.  In  the  occupancy  of  his  London  apart- 
ments Mr.  Spencer  himself  is  more  of  a  land  user,  value  con- 
sidered, than  many  a  small  farmer. 


230  EECANTATION. 

ership  of  land  by  the  state  is  made  real  and  actual  by 
the  taking  for  the  use  of  the  community,  by  the  rep- 
resentatives of  tlie  community,  of  the  rents  that  are 
(or  should  be)  paid  by  occupiers  of  land. 

Truly  "  Justice  "  is  a  suprising  book.  Here  we  have 
Mr.  Spencer  going  back  to  the  very  principle  he  has 
just  recanted. 

In  one  sentence  of  this  paragraph  he  says  that  we 
have  no  evidence  that  this  equitable  adjustment  of 
the  rights  to  land  in  conformity  with  the  needs  of  the 
civilized  state  has  ever  arisen,  since  the  original  own- 
ership of  land  by  the  community  has  been  habitually 
usurped,  and  in  another  sentence  he  says  vaguely 
that  it  has  arisen  only  here  and  there.  But  that  it  may 
arise  and  ought  to  arise,  and  would  give  an  even  theo- 
retically perfect  basis  to  the  right  of  propertj'',  this 
section  states,  if  not  as  clearly,  but  yet  on  careful 
reading  as  unmistakably  as  does  "Social  Statics" 
itself. 

The  paragraph  just  quoted  is  followed  by  this 
recapitulatory  paragraph,  with  which  the  section 
closes : 

But  admitting  that  the  establishment  of  an  ethically 
complete  right  of  property  is  beset  with  difficulties  like 
those  wliich  beset  the  establishment  of  an  ethically  com- 
plete right  to  the  use  of  the  earth,  we  are  nevertlieless 
shown  by  a  survey  of  the  facts  which  existing  primitive 
societies  present,  and  the  facts  traceable  in  the  early 
histories  of  civilized  societies,  that  the  right  of  property 
is  originally  deducible  from  the  laAV  of  equal  freedom  ; 
and  that  it  ceases  to  be  so  deducible  only  when  the  other 
corollaries  from  the  law  of  equal  freedom  have  been 
disregarded. 

Or  to  put  this  statement  of  the  propositions  of  this 
section  in  fuller  form,  they  are  :  (1)  That  the  estab- 


"JUSTICE."  —  THE    IIIGHT   OF    PllOPERTY.      231 

lishment  of  the  right  of  property  is  beset  by  the  diffi- 
culties of  showing  that  the  right  of  a  man  to  tlie 
material  element  from  which  property  is  obtained  is 
greater  than  the  rights  of  all  existing  men  put  together. 
(2)  But  in  primitive  societies  and  in  the  early  his- 
tory of  civilized  societies,  where  the  use  of  land  is 
open  to  all,  this  equality  of  access  to  land  enables  us 
to  deduce  the  right  of  property  in  things  produced 
by  labor  from  the  law  of  equal  freedom ;  and  (3)  it 
ceases  to  be  so  deducible  where  equahty  in  the  use  of 
land  is  denied,  as  in  civilized  societies  at  present ;  but 
would  again  become  deducible  from  the  law  of  equal 
freedom  if  the  rent  of  land  were  taken  for  the  use  of 
the  society. 

If  Mr.  Spencer  had  written  "  Justice  "  under  coer- 
cion ;  if  imprisoned  in  the  chambers  of  an  Inquisi- 
tion, and  under  fear  of  the  rack,  he  had  been  forced 
against  his  will,  like  Galileo,  to  recant  what  he  still 
held  to  be  true,  we  might  well  believe  that  this  Sec- 
tion 54  of  "  Justice  "  contained  his  sign  to  posterity 
that  in  spite  of  the  denials  he  had  just  been  compelled 
to  make  he  in  his  heart  held  to  the  truth. 

But  though,  unfortunately,  the  conditions  do  not 
admit  of  such  a  conclusion,  this  section  is  perhaps  an 
even  stronger  testimony  to  the  power  of  truth. 
In  the  preceding  chapter  Mr.  Spencer  has  forced 
back  his  better  nature,  and  defended  landlordism 
as  well  as  the  man  who  had  written  "  Social  Stat- 
ics "  could.  But  when  after  an  interval  of  over 
forty  years  he  begins  to  rewrite  his  old  chapter  on 
"  The  Right  of  Property,"  tlie  truth  he  once  held 
reasserts  its  sway,  and  though  he  cuts  out  all  that 
might  give  open  offence  to  his  new  clients,  the  per- 


232  RECANTATION. 

ception  of  truth,  as  by  "  unconscious  cerebration," 
causes  him  in  the  very  first  section  to  relapse,  and 
to  tell  us  —  unmistakably,  if  not  clearly  —  that  in 
the  civilized  state  it  is  only  the  appropriation  of  rent 
to  the  use  of  the  whole  community  that  can  give  to 
property  an  ethical  basis. 

But  Mr.  Spencer  soon  recovers  himself.  Having  in 
Section  54  shown  that  in  rude  societies  there  is  a 
substantial  basis  for  the  right  of  property,  but  that  in 
highly  civilized  countries,  such  as  England,  the  equi- 
table right  of  property  has  been  submerged  by  the 
usurpation  of  land-ownership,  he  proceeds  in  Sec- 
tion 55  to  assert,  as  he  did  in  the  preceding  chap- 
ter, that  the  course  of  modern  civilization  has  been 
more  fully  to  establish  this  right. 

Section  55  begins : 

This  deduction  [i.e.,  of  the  right  of  property  from 
the  law  of  equal  freedom  through  the  equal  right  to  the 
use  of  land],  early  recognized  in  custom  and  afterwards 
formulated  by  legislators,  has  come  to  be  elaborated  and 
enforced  more  and  more  fully  as  society  has  developed. 

Then  comes  something  about  primitive  societies, 
the  patriarchal  group  and  the  house  community,  in 
which  occurs  the  reference  to  inherent  value  already 
quoted  on  page  51,  and  the  section  thus  closes : 

To  trace  the  development  of  the  right  of  property  as 
established  by  rulers  and  administered  by  their  agents, 
setting  out  with  the  interdict  on  theft  in  the  Hebrew 
commandments,  and  continuing  down  to  modern  days, 
in  which  proprietorships  of  all  kinds  have  been  legally 
formulated  in  multitudinous  detail  and  with  great  pre- 
cision, would  be  no  less  out  of  place  than  it  would  be 
superfluous.  It  suffices  for  present  purposes  to  note  that 
this  implication  of  the  principle  of  justice,  perceived 
from  the  first  perhaps  more  clearly  than  any  other,  has 


"JUSTICE." — THE   KIGHT    OF   PROPERTY.       233 

gained  in  the  course  of  social  progress  increased  definite- 
ness  of  recognition  as  well  as  increased  extension  and 
increased  pereniptoriness ;  so  that  now,  breach  of  the 
right  of  property  by  unauthorized  appropriation  of  a 
turnip  or  a  few  sticks,  has  become  a  punishable  offence ; 
and  there  is  ownership  of  a  song,  of  a  pattern,  of  a  trade- 
mark. 

The  principle  of  justice  in  the  right  of  property 
perceived  from  the  first,  as  Mr.  Spencer  has  just  ex- 
plained, is  equality  in  the  use  of  natural  opportunities. 
Has  this  principle  gained  by  a  social  progress,  which 
as  exemplified  in  England,  now  denies  nineteen- 
twentietlis  of  the  people  of  all  right  whatever  in  the 
land  of  their  birth,  punishes  them  if  they  take  a  hand- 
ful of  wild  fruit  or  a  few  sticks  from  the  abundant 
offerings  of  nature,  creates  private  ownership  in  a 
salmon  fishery,  a  coal  mine,  an  advowson  or  a 
hereditary  pension,  and  condemns  millions  to  chronic 
pauperism  ? 

This  is  what  Mr.  Spencer's  examination  of  the 
right  of  property  in  "Justice"  amounts  to:  First 
showing  that  the  right  of  property  in  civilized  socie- 
ties has  to-day  no  ethical  basis,  he  goes  on  to  make 
believe  that  it  has,  and  from  this  basis  of  make- 
believe  to  assume  the  ethical  validity  of  existing 
conditions.  And  then  he  virtuously  turns  on  the 
communists.  They  are  a  feeble  folk  and  have  no 
friends. 

In  this  he  follows  the  order  of  "  Social  Statics," 
but  the  spirit  is  that  of  "  The  Man  versus  the  State." 
He  ignores  Avhat  he  once  saw  plainly,  the  incentive 
to  communistic  and  socialistic  schemes  in  the  bitter 
wrong  and  widespread  suffering  of  the  existing  order, 
declares  their  motive  to  be  the  desire  to  take  from  the 


234  RECANTATION. 

worker  the  produce  of  his  work,  and  assumes  that 
between  them  and  existing  social  conditions  lies  the 
only  choice.     Here  is  the  section  : 

§  56.  Supposing  themselves  to  be  justified,  and  indeed 
eujoiued  by  moral  principle,  many  in  our  days  are  seeking 
to  over-ride  this  right.  They  think  it  wrong  that  eacli 
man  should  receive  benefits  proportionate  to  his  efforts 
—  deny  that  he  ma}^  properl}^  keep  possession  of  all 
which  his  labor  has  produced,  leaving  the  less  capable  in 
possession  of  all  wliich  their  labors  have  produced.  Ex- 
pressed in  its  briefest  form,  their  doctrine  is  —  Let 
unlike  kinds  and  amounts  of  work  bring  like  shares 
of  produce  —  let  there  be  "  equal  division  of  unequal 
earnings." 

That  communism  implies  violation  of  justice  as  de- 
fined in  foregoing  chapters,  is  manifest.  When  we  assert 
the  liberty  of  each  bounded  only  by  the  like  liberties  of 
all,  we  assert  that  each  is  free  to  keep  for  himself  all 
those  gratifications  and  sources  of  gratification  which  he 
procures  without  trespassing  on  the  spheres  of  action 
of  his  neighbors.  If,  therefore,  one  obtains  by  his 
greater  strengtli,  greater  ingenuity,  or  greater  applica- 
tion, more  gratifications  or  sources  of  gratification,  than 
others,  and  does  this  without  in  any  way  trenching  on 
the  spheres  of  action  of  others,  tlie  law  of  equal  freedom 
assigns  him.  exclusive  possession  of  all  such  extra  grati- 
fications and  sources  of  gratification  ;  nor  can  others  take 
them  from  him  without  claiming  for  themselves  greater 
liberty  of  action  than  he  claims,  and  thereby  violating 
the  law. 

In  past  times  the  arrangements  made  were  such  that 
the  few  superior  profited  at  the  expense  of  the  many 
inferior.  It  is  now  proposed  to  make  arrangements 
such  that  the  many  inferior  shall  profit  at  the  expense 
of  the  few  superior.  And  just  as  the  old  social  system 
was  assumed  by  those  who  maintained  it  to  be  equitable, 
so  is  this  new  social  system  assumed  to  be  equitable 
by  those  who  propose  it.  Being,  as  they  tliink,  un- 
doubtedly right,  this  distribution  may  properly  be  estab- 
lished by  force ;  for  the  employment  of  force,  if  not 
avowedly  contemplated,  is  contemplated  by  implication. 


"JUSTICE." — THE   EIGHT   OF   PROPERTY.      235 

With  a  human  nature  such  as  has  been  known  through- 
out the  past  and  is  known  at  present,  one  who,  by  higher 
power,  bodily  or  mental,  or  greater  endurance  of  work, 
gains  more  than  others  gain,  will  not  voluntarily  sur- 
render the  excess  to  such  others  :  here  and  there  may  be 
found  a  man  who  would  do  tliis,  but  he  is  far  from  being 
the  average  man.  And  if  the  average  superior  man  will 
not  voluntarily  surrender  to  others  the  excess  of  benefit 
gained  by  his  superiority,  the  implication  is  that  he 
must  be  obliged  to  do  this,  and  that  the  use  of  force 
to  oblige  him  is  justitiable.  That  the  many  inferior  are 
physically  able  thus  to  coerce  the  few  superior  is  agreed 
on  both  sides,  but  the  assumption  of  the  communists  is 
that  the  required  coercion  of  tlie  minority  who  are  best 
by  the  majority  who  are  worst  would  be  equitable. 

After  what  was  said  in  the  early  chapter  of  this  Part, 
it  scarcely  needs  pointing  out  that  a  system  established 
in  pursuance  of  this  doctrine  would  entail  degeneration 
of  citizens  and  decay  of  the  community  formed  by  them. 
Suspension  of  that  natural  discipline  by  which  every 
kind  of  creature  is  kept  fit  for  the  activities  demanded 
by  the  conditions  of  life,  would  inevitably  bring  about 
unfitness  for  life  and  either  prompt  or  slow  disappearance. 

An  old  fable  tells  us  that  when  the  plague  raged 
among  the  animals  they  concluded  that  among  them 
was  some  great  criminal,  who  must  be  sacrificed  to 
the  wrath  of  heaven,  and  agreed  that  to  discover  him 
all  should  confess  their  sins.  The  fox  volunteered  to 
act  as  judge.  He  listened  with  equanimity  to  the 
lion's  recital  of  flocks  devoured  and  men  slaughtered, 
declaring  his  majesty  blameless,  and  in  the  same  way 
excused  all  that  the  tiger,  the  hyena,  the  wolf,  and 
the  bear  confessed.  At  length  came  a  poor  ass,  who 
told  how,  when  his  master  had  forgotten  to  give  him 
his  breakfast,  he  had  nibbled  a  few  leaves  from  his 
load  of  cabbages.  "  You  impious  rascal !  "  cried  the 
fox,  "  it  is  you  beyond  doubt  who  have  brought  on 
us  the  anger  of  the  gods  ! "  and  applauding  the  de- 


236  RECANTATION. 

cision  and  following  his  lead,  the  lordly  animals  threw 
themselves  on  the  poor  ass  and  tore  him  to  pieces. 

As  the  nibbling  of  a  cabbage  leaf  is  to  Herod's 
slaughter  of  the  innocents,  so  is  the  di-eam  of  a  few 
communists  compared  with  what  the  monopoly  of 
land  is  actually  doing.  In  the  highest  civilization 
in  other  respects  that  the  world  has  yet  seen  this 
monopoly  is,  even  now,  entailing  the  degradation  of 
citizens  and  decay  of  the  community,  so  that  Mr. 
Spencer  cannot  look  out  of  the  windows  of  his  club 
without  seeing  men  turned  into  advertising  signs  ; 
or  get  into  a  cab  without  having  some  miserable 
wretch  officiously  hasten  to  close  the  door  in  the 
hope  of  a  penny ;  or  travel  through  the  three  king- 
doms without  beholding  the  decay  of  poj)ulation  in 
the  country  and  its  congestion  in  the  slums  of  towns? 
It  is,  even  now,  suspending  "  that  natural  discipline 
by  which  every  creature  is  kept  fit  for  the  activities 
demanded  by  the  conditions  of  life,"  so  that  men  are 
being  destro3-ed,  on  the  one  side  by  repletion  and 
debauchery,  and  on  the  other  side  by  privation  and  the 
denial  of  opportunities  for  honest  work.  It  is,  even 
now,  taking  the  ^^I'oduce  of  their  work  from  superior 
worker  and  inferior  worker  alike,  and  is  giving  the 
gratifications  and  sources  of  gratification  earned  by 
work  to  those  who  do  no  work — is  piling  up  wealth 
in  the  hands  of  those  wlio  do  nothing  to  produce 
wealth,  who  as  land-owners  are  useless  appropriators 
and  worse  than  useless  destroyers.  To  this  giant 
wrong,  this  most  monstrous  of  all  denials  of  the  law 
of  equal  freedom,  Mr.  Spencer  is  as  complaisant  as 
the  fox  Vas  to  the  lion,  while  he  vents  his  indigna- 
tion on  the  poor  ass  of  communism. 


"JUSTICE." — THE   RIGHT   OF    PUOPERTY.      237 

The  next  and  final  chapter  shows  liow  far  Mr. 
Spencer  really  wishes  to  assert  the  right  of  property. 
It  was,  as  he  knows,  by  violating  the  right  of  prop- 
erty in  putting  taxes  on  the  products  of  labor  that 
the  larger  tenants  of  English  land  made  themselves 
its  virtual  owners  and  that  private  property  in  land 
has  come  to  be  established  in  tliose  wide  regions 
to  which  English  institutions  have  been  extended. 
And  it  is  on  the  line  of  abolishing  this  taxation 
of  labor  and  the  products  of  labor  that,  as  is  now 
evident,  the  struggle  for  the  resumption  of  equal 
rights  in  land  will  in  English-speaking  countries  be 
made  —  nay,  is  already  beginning  to  be  made.  So 
in  the  next  section  Mr.  Spencer  brings  out  his 
double-barrelled  ethics  to  break  down  the  right  of 
property  and  to  open  the  door  for  wliat  is  essenti- 
ally socialism  and  communism  in  the  interests  of  the 
rich: 

§  57.  While  absolute  ethics  thus  asserts  the  right  of 
property,  and  wliile  no  such  breach  of  it  as  is  implied 
by  the  schemes  of  communists  is  warranted  by  that 
relative  ethics  wliich  takes  account  of  transitional  needs, 
relative  ethics  dictates  such  limitation  of  it  as  is  neces- 
sitated for  defraying  the  costs  of  protection,  national 
and  individual. 

The  truth  recognized  at  the  outset,  that  the  preser- 
vation of  the  species,  or  that  variety  of  it  constituting  a 
nation,  is  an  end  which  must  take  precedence  of  indi- 
vidual preservation,  has  already  been  cited  as  justifying 
that  subordination  of  the  right  to  life  which  is  implied 
by  exposure  to  possible  death  in  defensive  war,  and  as 
also  justifying  that  subordination  of  the  right  to  lib- 
erty wliich  military  service  and  subjection  necessitate. 
Here  it  must  be  again  cited  as  affording  a  legitimate 
reason  for  appropriating  such  portions  of  the  posses- 
sions and  tlie  earnings  of  individuals,  as  may  be  re- 
quired for   adequately  resisting   enemies.       But   while 


238  RECANTATION. 

there  is  thus  a  quasi-ethical  justification  for  whatever 
encroachment  on  the  riglit  of  property  is  necessitated 
for  the  purposes  of  defensive  war,  there  is  no  justifica- 
tion for  any  such  encroachment  for  the  purposes  of 
offensive  war. 

No  less  manifest  is  it  that  the  right  of  property  is 
legitimately  subject  to  one  further  restriction.  Prop- 
erty must  be  trenched  upon  for  supporting  tliose  pub- 
lic administrations  by  which  the  right  of  property,  and 
all  other  rights,  are  enforced.  In  a  society  wholly  com- 
posed of  men  who  duly  respected  one  another's  claims, 
no  such  partial  invasion  of  the  right  of  property  would 
be  called  for ;  but  in  existing  societies  and  in  such 
societies  as  are  likely  to  exist  for  a  long  time  to  come, 
the  nearest  approach  to  fulfilment  of  the  law  of  equal 
freedom  is  made  when  the  various  deduced  rights  are 
sacrificed  to  the  extent  needful  for  preservation  of  the 
remainders.  Relative  ethics,  therefore,  warrants  such 
equitably-distributed  taxation  as  is  required  for  main- 
taining order  and  safety. 

Since  the  ethical  commands,  thou  shalt  do  no  mur- 
der and  thou  shalt  not  steal,  mean  also,  thou  shalt 
not  permit  thyself  to  be  murdered  or  to  be  stolen 
from,  the  justification  of  defensive  war  needs  no 
invention  of  relative  ethics.  Nor  is  this  needed  to 
justify  under  extraordinary  circumstances  what  under 
ordinary  circumstances  would  be  violations  of  the 
right  of  i:)roperty.  Take  Johnstown,  when  the  sun 
rose  on  wreck  and  ruin  and  death  in  their  most  awful 
forms,  and  on  men  and  w^omen  half  crazed  with  lis- 
teninor  all  nionht  lon^  to  the  shrieks  that  came  from  the 

O  O  O 

flaming  mass  of  float-wood  into  which  the  flood  was 
sweeping  their  nearest  and  dearest.  In  ordering  the 
destruction  of  all  liquor,  the  seizing  of  all  food,  and 
the  impressment,  should  that  be  necessary,  of  all  who 
could  work,  in  a  systematized  effort  to  succor  who 
still  might  be  succored  and  to  bury  what  remained  to 


"JUSTICE."' — -THE    RIGHT   OF    PROPERTY.      239 

bury  of  the  dead,  was  not  Arthur  Moxham  acting, 
in  the  name  of  the  reason  and  conscience  of  the  com- 
munity, on  the  same  eternal  principles  of  right  and 
wrong  that  in  ordinary  conditions  would  have  forbid- 
den these  things  ?  What  in  form  was  a  denial  of  the 
rights  of  property  and  person  was  in  its  essence 
respect  for  life  and  property. 

But  while  changing  conditions  may  change  the 
application  of  ethical  principles,  it  is  only  as  the 
change  in  a  ship's  course  turns  the  compass  card 
in  her  binacle.  The  change  is  in  the  conditions  not 
in  the  principles.  And  if  there  be  an  ethical  right 
of  property,  then,  except  under  conditions  of  immi- 
nent danger  and  dire  stress,  a  community  cannot 
be  justified  in  taking  property  by  force  from  the 
individual. 

What  Mr.  Spencer  does  in  this  section,  in  the  name 
of  his  convenient  fiction  of  relative  ethics,  is  to  jus- 
tify the  habitual  violations  of  the  light  of  property 
which  are  committed  under  the  name  of  government 
in  all  civilized  countries,  and  thus  to  make  his  phi- 
losophy of  things  as  they  ought  to  be,  conform  the 
better  with  things  as  the  ruling  classes  desire  to 
maintain  them.  And  he  does  this  effectually,  for  he 
leaves  the  right  of  property  without  defence,  save  in 
idle  platitudes,  against  those  forms  of  taxation  which 
have  everywhere  proved  so  efficient  in  robbing  the 
many  and  enriching  the  few. 

To  be  sure  Mr.  Spencer  justifies  the  taking  of  prop- 
erty by  taxation  only  for  purposes  of  defensive  war 
and  the  maintenance  of  order  and  safety.  But  such 
limitations  are  practically  no  limitations.  Neither  an 
English  jingo  nor  an   American  protectionist  would 


240  RECANTATION. 

quarrel  with  them.  No  invading  foot  has  trod 
English  soil,  no  hostile  fleet  has  fired  a  shot  at  an 
English  town,  since  the  English  national  debt  began 
to  form.  Yet  what  one  of  all  the  wars  for  which  the 
English  masses  have  paid  in  blood  and  privation  and 
of  which  this  great  debt  is  the  reminder,  has  not  been 
advocated  at  the  time  as  a  defensive  war?  Is  not 
our  monstrous  American  tariff  declared  by  its  advo- 
cates to  be  necessary  to  the  maintenance  of  order  and 
safety  ?  What  has  been  the  assigned  reason  for  the 
maintenance  of  every  fat  English  sinecure  but  order 
and  safety  ? 

Granted  that  Mr.  Spencer  would  abolish  the  more 
flagrant  abuses  of  taxation  ;  or,  as  in  the  light  of  his 
changes  on  the  land  question  we  may  more  certainly 
say,  granted  that  he  is  in  favor  of  abolishing  them  so 
long  as  Sir  John  and  his  Grace  do  not  seriously 
object;  yet  in  admitting  that  the  right  of  property 
may  justly  be  set  aside  by  the  state  for  ordinary 
public  needs  and  uses,  he  opens  the  door  for  every 
abuse  that  the  ruling  power  —  the  majority,  if  you 
please  —  may  at  any  time  choose  to  deem  a  use.  He 
leaves  no  principle  save  the  shifting  one  of  expe- 
diency to  guard  the  right  of  property  against  any 
interest  or  desire  or  whim  that  may  gain  control  of 
the  legislative  power. 

But  the  reign  of  relative  ethics,  like  that  of  the 
old-fashioned  devil,  to  which  it  bears  some  analogy, 
is  not  to  be  forever,  for  we  are  given  to  understand 
that  when  evolution  has  carried  the  descendants  of 
what  are  now  the  human  race  to  a  point  as  far  above 
us  as  it  has  carried  us  above  the  monkey,  and  brought 
on   the  agnostic    millennium,  relative    ethics   are   to 


"  JUSTICE."  —  THE   RIGHT  OF  PEOPERTY.      241 

vanish  in  the  unknowable  pit.  So  Mr.  Spencer  tells 
us  that  "in  a  society  composed  of  men  who  duly- 
respected  one  another's  claims,  no  such  partial  inva- 
sion of  the  rights  of  property  would  be  called  for." 
But  then,  he  continues,  it  is  called  for  "  in  existing 
societies  and  in  such  societies  as  are  likely  to  exist 
for  a  long  time  to  come."  What  ground  does  that 
give  me  to  assert  that  I  am  robbed  directly  by  the 
blackmail  demanded  in  the  name  of  duty  at  the 
American  post-office  every  time  a  friend  sends  me  a 
book  from  a  foreign  country,  or  even  from  Canada, 
and  am  robbed  indirectl}'  every  day  of  my  life  in  the 
purchases  I  make?  The  protectionist,  if  a  Spence- 
rian  and  disposed  to  argue,  would  simply  reply, 
"  You  are  talking  absolute  ethics,  whereas,  as  Her- 
bert Spencer  has  shown,  we  are  now  under  the  rule 
of  relative  ethics." 

It  is  true,  but  in  a  sense  that  Mr.  Spencer  does 
not  mean,  that  if  men  duly  respected  one  another's 
claims,  no  taking  of  individual  property  in  taxation 
by  the  state  would  be  necessary.  For  if  men  duly 
respected  one  another's  claims  to  the  use  of  land,  all 
necessity  for  invading  the  right  of  property  by  taxa- 
tion would  disappear.  Either  by  the  single  tax  on 
land  values  or  by  the  crude  and  clumsy  scheme  of 
land  nationalization  proposed  by  Mr.  Spencer  himself 
in  "  Social  Statics,"  enough  revenue  would  accrue  to 
the  state  to  defray  all  needed  expenses  without  taking 
a  penny  of  any  man's  property.  But  if  men  are  to 
continue  to  disregard  each  other's  claims  to  the  use 
of  land,  and  to  continue  to  treat  that  element  as  be- 
longing to  a  few  individuals —  and  this  Mr.  Spencer 
now  insists  on  —  then  there  is  no  possible  improve- 


242  RECANTATION. 

ment  in  society  or  in  the  race  that  could  dispense 
with  the  taking  of  property  by  taxation. 

Mr.  Spencer  evidently  entertains  the  innocent 
notion  that  could  the  soldier  and  the  policeman  be 
done  away  with,  there  would  be  no  further  need  for 
public  revenues,  and  all  organized  government  could 
be  dispensed  with.  But  would  not  civilized  societies 
still  need  revenues  for  building  and  keeping  roads 
and  bridges,  for  paving  and  cleaning  streets,  for 
establishing  lighthouses  and  supporting  a  fire  ser- 
vice, and  doing  the  many  things  which  become 
increasingly  necessary  to  the  public  health,  safety, 
comfort,  and  convenience,  as  social  integration  goes 
on  ?  Or  in  the  millennium  of  the  Spencerians,  as  in 
the  millennium  of  the  anarchists,  is  each  one  to  pave, 
clean  and  light  the  street  before  his  door,  when  and 
how  he  pleases  ?  are  roads,  bridges  and  public  works, 
as  to  which  competition  is  impossible,  to  be  left  to 
private  individuals  and  companies,  charging  what 
they  please  and  rendering  what  service  they  choose? 
and  are  all  other  public  functions  to  be  dependent  on 
volunteer  service  or  voluntary  subscription  ? 


CHAPTER  X. 

THE  EIGHT  OF  PROPERTY  AKD   THE  EIGHT  OF 
TAXATION. 

Of  such  primary  and  practical  importance  is  the 
question  just  raised,  that  it  is  worth  while  to  discuss 
it  more  fully. 

Mr.  Spencer,  in  a  book  he  has  re-issued  this  year, 
has  flippantly  accused  "  Mr.  George  and  his  friends  " 
with  asserting  the  absolute  right  of  the  community 
over  the  possessions  of  each  member.  Yet  in  nothing 
is  the  divergence  between  us  and  the  common  opin- 
ion more  sharply  shown  than  in  this,  that  we  utterly 
deny  the  right  of  the  community  to  take  the  property 
of  the  individual  for  any  purpose  whatsoever,  except 
under  circumstances  where  all  rights  must  yield  to 
the  supreme  right  of  self-preservation.  There  may 
be  circumstances  of  such  sudden  stress  and  dansrer 
as  would  justify  an  individual  in  taking  the  horse  or 
boat  of  another  individual,  in  making  use  of  his  house, 
his  goods,  or  anything  that  is  his  ;  and  so  there  may 
be  similar  circumstances  that  will  justify  such  taking 
of  individual  property  on  the  part  of  a  community. 
But  short  of  this,  which  is  not  a  limitation  but  an 
abrogation,  we  hold  the  right  of  property  to  be  abso- 
lute, and  deny  the  proposition  which  Mr.  Spencer  in 
the  chapter  just  quoted  asserts,  and  which  is  commonly 
conceded,  that  the  right  of  property  is  limited  by  the 
right  of  the  state  to  take  in  taxation  what  it  may 


244  RECANTATION. 

think  it  needs.  Thus  we  are  to-day  the  defenders  of 
the  right  of  property  as  against  communists,  protec- 
tionists, and  socialists,  as  well  as  against  such  moderate 
deniers  of  the  right  of  property  as  the  revenue 
tariffites  of  the  Cobden  Club  class,  and  such  half-way 
individualists  as  the  Liberty  and  Property  Defence 
League  and  Mr.  Auberon  Herbert's  associations. 

How  then  is  it  that  we  are  called  deniers  of  the 
right  of  property  ? 

It  is  for  the  same  reason  that,  when  I  was  a  boy, 
caused  nine-tenths  of  the  good  people  in  the  United 
States,  north  as  well  as  south,  to  regard  abolitionists 
as  deniers  of  the  right  of  property ;  the  same  reason 
that  made  even  John  Wesley  look  on  a  smuggler  as 
a  kind  of  robber,  and  on  a  custom-house  seizer  of 
other  men's  goods  as  a  defender  of  law  and  order. 
Where  violations  of  the  right  of  property  have  been 
long  sanctioned  by  custom  and  law,  it  is  inevitable 
that  those  who  really  assert  the  right  of  property  will 
at  first  be  thought  to  deny  it.  For  under  such 
circumstances  the  idea  of  property  becomes  confused, 
and  that  is  thought  to  be  property  which  is  in  reality 
a  violation  of  property. 

That  such  confusion  exists  to-day  may  be  seen  in 
the  way  in  which  the  great  struggle  for  better  condi- 
tions of  life  for  the  masses,  that  all  over  the  civilized 
world  has  begun  or  is  impending,  is  generally  regarded 
by  both  sides.  Except  b}^  the  single-tax  men,  and 
possibly  by  the  philosophic  anarchists,  it  is  thought 
of  as  a  struggle  between  caj)ital  and  labor  —  a  contest 
between  the  rights  of  man  and  the  rights  of  property. 
It  is  not  merely  that  one  side  charges  the  other  side 
with  proposing  to  impair  the  right  of  property.    It  is, 


PROrEllTY   AND   TAXATION.  245 

that,  with  the  exceptions  noted,  those  who  woukl 
better  secure  the  rights  of  men,  do  propose  restric- 
tions and  denials  of  the  right  of  property.  So,  from 
the  thorough-going  socialists  who  would  have  the 
state  appropriate  all  capital  and  direct  all  industry, 
to  those  milk-and-water  socialists  who  are  willing 
to  play  at  doing  something,  by  encouraging  trades 
unions,  and  by  two-penny  alms  and  restrictions,  and 
by  attempts  to  make  the  rich  less  rich,  and  conse- 
quently as  they  think  the  poor  less  poor,  through 
income  and  succession  taxes  and  Irish  Land  Acts, 
we  find  those  who  aim,  or  profess  to  aim  at  improv- 
ing the  conditions  of  the  laboring  masses,  advocating 
measures  which  are  violations  of  the  right  of  property. 
In  this  confusion  of  thought  we  who  hold  that  the 
right  of  property  is  an  absolute  right,  we  who  say 
that  the  command  "  Thou  shalt  not  steal  "  applies  to 
the  state  as  fully  as  to  the  individual,  are  looked  upon 
by  one  side  as  deniers  of  the  right  of  property,  and  by 
the  other  —  even  by  the  poor,  timid  university  social- 
ists—  as  not  radical  enough. 

Yet  to  whoever  will  grasp  first  principles  it  must 
be  evident : 

That  there  can  be  no  real  conflict  between  labor 
and  capital  —  since  capital  is  in  origin  and  essence 
but  the  product  and  tool  of  labor ; 

That  there  can  be  no  real  antagonism  between  the 
rights  of  men  and  the  rights  of  property  —  since  the 
right  of  property  is  but  the  expression  of  a  funda- 
mental right  of  man ; 

That  the  road  to  the  improvement  of  the  conditions 
of  the  masses  cannot  be  the  road  of  restricting  and 
denying  the  right  of  property,  but  can  only  be  that 


246  KECANTATION. 

of  securing  most  fully  the  right  of  property ;  and  that 
all  measures  that  impair  the  right  of  proj^erty  must 
in  the  end  injure  the  masses  —  since  while  it  may  be 
possible  that  a  few  may  get  a  living  or  be  aided  in 
getting  a  living  by  robbery,  it  is  utterly  impossible 
that  the  many  should. 

It  is  not  as  deniers,  but  as  asserters  of  the  equal 
rights  of  man,  that  we  who  for  want  of  a  better  name 
call  ourselves  single-tax  men  so  strenuously  uphold 
the  right  of  property.  It  is  not  because  we  would 
palter  with  a  social  system  that  condemns  the  masses 
to  hard  work  and  low  wages,  to  absolute  want  and 
starvation  more  or  less  disguised;  but  because  we 
would  bring  about  a  social  system  in  which  it  would 
be  impossible  for  any  one  to  want  or  to  starve  unless 
he  deserved  to.  It  is  not  because  we  are  less  radical, 
but  because  in  the  true  sense  we  are  more  radical 
than  the  socialists  of  all  degrees. 

Let  me  ask  those  who  think  there  is  any  conflict 
between  the  rights  of  men  and  the  rights  of  property 
to  name  any  denial  of  the  rights  of  men  which  is  not 
or  does  not  involve  a  denial  of  the  rights  of  property ; 
or  any  denial  of  the  rights  of  property  which  is  not 
or  does  not  involve  a  denial  of  the  rights  of  men. 
Take  chattel  slavery.  Was  that  an  assertion  of  the 
right  of  property  or  a  denial  of  the  right  of  property  ? 

Or,  consider  any  system  of  tyranny  or  oppression 
by  which  the  personal  liberties  of  men  have  been 
denied  or  curtailed.  Take  out  of  it  the  element 
which  infringes  the  right  of  property  and  is  not  its 
efficacy  gone  ? 

On  the  other  hand,  take  anything  which  denies  or 
impairs  the  right  of  property  —  robbery,  brigandage, 


PKOPERTY   AND   TAXATION.  247 

piracy,  war,  customs  duties,  excises,  or  taxes  on  wealth 
in  any  of  its  forms  —  do  they  not  all  violate  per- 
sonal liberty,  directly  and  indirectly  ? 

This  is  not  an  accidental,  but  a  necessary  connec- 
tion. The  right  of  life  and  liberty  —  that  is  to  say, 
the  right  of  tlie  man  to  himself  —  is  not  really  one 
right  and  the  right  of  property  another  right.  They 
are  two  aspects  of  the  same  perception  —  the  right  of 
property  being  but  another  side,  a  differently  stated 
expression,  of  the  right  of  man  to  himself.  The  right 
to  life  and  liberty,  the  right  of  the  individual  to  him- 
himself,  presupposes  and  involves  the  right  of  prop- 
erty, which  is  the  exclusive  right  of  the  individual  to 
the  things  his  exertion  has  produced. 

This  is  the  reason  why  we  who  really  believe  in 
the  law  of  liberty,  we  who  see  in  freedom  the  great 
solvent  for  all  social  evils,  are  the  stanchest  and 
most  unflinching  supporters  of  the  rights  of  property, 
and  would  guard  it  as  scrupulously  in  the  case  of  the 
millionnaire  as  in  the  case  of  the  day  laborer. 

But  what  is  property  ?  This  we  must  keep  clearly 
in  mind  if,  in  attempting  to  see  what  the  right  of 
property  does  and  does  not  permit,  we  would  avoid 
confusion.  The  question  is  not  what  the  state  sanc- 
tions, but  what  it  may  rightfully  sanction.  There 
are  those  who  say  that  the  right  of  property,  as  all 
other  rights,  are  derived  from  the  state.  But  they  do 
not  really  think  this  ;  for  they  are  as  ready  as  any  one 
else  to  say  of  any  proposed  state  action  that  it  is  right 
or  it  is  wrong,  in  which  they  assert  some  standard  of 
action  higher  than  the  state. 

Property  —  not  property  in  the  legal  sense,  for  that 
may  be  anything  which  greed  or  perversity  may  have 


248  RECANTATION. 

power  to  ordain  ;  but  property  in  the  ethical  sense  — 
is  that  which  carries  with  it  the  right  of  exclusive 
ownership,  including  the  right  to  give,  sell,  bequeath 
or  destroy. 

To  what  sort  of  things  does  such  right  of  owner- 
ship rightfully  attach  ? 

Clearly  to  things  produced  by  labor,  and  to  no 
other. 

And  that  this  rightful  ownership  can  only  attach  to 
things  produced  by  labor  is  always  shown  by  those 
who  try  to  assert  such  right  of  ownership  in  other 
things.  For  invariably,  instead  of  proving  a  right  of 
ownership  in  such  other  things,  they  devote  them- 
selves to  proving  the  right  of  ownership  in  things 
produced  by  labor,  and  then  assume  that  in  some  way 
the  right  thus  accruing  has  become  transferred  to 
things  of  a  different  nature. 

Mr.  Spencer  is  an  example  of  this,  as  are  all  with- 
out exception  who  have  ever  written  on  the  side  he 
has  now  assumed.  He  wishes  in  this  book  to  justify 
property  in  land.  But  he  only  justifies  property  in 
the  products  of  labor,  and  then  insinuates  what  he 
dares  not  clearly  state  —  that  by  some  process  of  trans- 
fer or  conjoinment  the  right  of  ownership  in  the  pro- 
ducts of  labor  has  become  transmuted  into  a  right  of 
ownership  in  land. 

In  this,  however,  he  does  as  well  as  any  one  who 
ever  attempted  it.  The  logical  processes  of  those  who 
attempt  to  prove  a  j'iglit  of  exclusive  ownership  in 
land  are  always  akin  to  those  of  the  bum-boat  man, 
who,  having  agreed  to  bring  the  sailor  a  white  mon- 
key, brought  him  instead  a  yellow  dog  which  he  in- 
sisted liad  eaten  a  white  monkey.     They  are  like  a 


PEOPEKTY   AND   TAXATION,  249 

lawyer  who,  called  on  to  prove  his  client's  title  to  an 
estate,  should  go  on  to  prove  his  client's  title  to  the 
money  which  he  gave  for  the  estate. 

The  ethical  right  of  property  is  so  perfectly  clear 
as  to  be  beyond  all  dispute  —  as  to  be  testified  to  by 
all  who  attempt  to  assert  some  other  right  of  prop- 
erty. It  springs  from  the  right  of  each  man  to  use 
his  own  powers  and  enjoy  their  results.  And  it  is  a 
full  and  absolute  right.  Whatever  a  man  produces 
belongs  to  liim  exclusively,  and  the  same  full  and 
exclusive  right  passes  from  him  to  his  grantor, 
assignee  or  devisee,  not  to  the  amount  of  eighty  or 
fifty  or  any  other  percentage,  but  in  full.  And  as  is 
shown  by  reason  and  as  is  proved  by  the  experience 
of  the  world,  the  advance  in  civilization  depends  upon 
the  recognition  of  this  right.  Therefore  for  the  State 
to  levy  taxes  on  that  which  is  truly  property,  that  is 
to  say,  upon  the  possession  of  wealtli  in  any  of  its 
forms,  is  unjust  and  injurious  —  is  a  denial  and  viola- 
tion of  the  light  of  property  and  of  the  rights  of  man. 

But  it  may  be  said :  In  an  isolated  condition  it  is 
true  that  a  man  is  entitled  to  all  that  he  produces,  and 
that  it  is  robbery  to  take  any  part  of  it  from  him 
against  his  will.  But  in  the  civilized  condition  it  is 
not  alone  the  exertion  of  the  individual  that  contri- 
butes to  his  production.  Over  and  above  wliat  the 
producer  receives  from  other  producers,  and  for  which 
he  recompenses  them  in  the  various  ways  by  which 
the  claims  between  man  and  man  are  settled  in 
ordered  society,  he  is  aided,  in  an  indefinite  yet  tan- 
gible way,  by  society  as  a  whole.  Does  he  not  there- 
fore owe  to  society  as  a  whole  some  return?  Is  not 
organized  society,  or  the  state,  entitled  therefore  to 


250  EECANTATION. 

claim  and  to  take  some  portion  of  what  in  an  isolated 
condition  would  be  rightfully  his  exclusive  property? 

We  reply :  There  is  such  a  debt,  but  the  producer 
cannot  escape  paying  it,  even  though  there  be  left  to 
him  in  full  what  is  his  by  the  right  of  property. 
Here  is  a  man  who  gives  to  a  painter  an  order  for  a 
beautiful  picture.  Can  he  alone  enjoy  it  ?  Here  is 
another  man  who  builds  a  factory,  or  works  out  a 
beneficial  invention.  Do  what  benefits  he  may  re- 
ceive, even  if  he  be  untaxed,  represent  the  sum  total 
of  its  benefits?  Does  not  what  he  has  done  also 
benefit  others  and  benefit  society  at  large  ?  And  if 
society  helps  the  individual  producer,  does  not  the 
individual  producer  also  help  society?  These  diffused 
benefits,  these  benefits  which  society  as  a  whole  re- 
ceives, are  something  separate  from  what  the  right 
of  property  accords  to  the  producer.  They  become 
tangible  in  the  value  of  land,  and  may  be  taken  by 
society  without  any  curtailment  of  the  right  of  prop- 
erty. To  bring  one  beautiful  picture  to  a  town  might 
not  perceptibly  increase  the  value  of  land.  But  bring 
a  number,  or  even  one  famous  picture,  and  the  value 
of  land  will  perceptibly  increase.  Place  the  pictures 
of  one  of  the  great  European  galleries  on  a  piece  of 
American  land  that  you  might  now  buy  for  a  hundred 
dollars  and  you  will  soon  find  a  value  of  millions 
attaching  to  that  land.  And  that  the  erection  of  a 
factory,  or  even  of  a  dwelling-house,  or  the  utilization 
of  a  beneficial  invention,  will  perceptibly  add  to  the 
value  of  land  every  one  knows.  Look  at  the  millions 
on  millions  which  the  elevated  roads  have  added  to 
the  value  of  New  York  lands. 

Again,  it  may  be  said,  as  Mr.  Spencer  now  says,  that 


PROrERTY   AND    TAXATION.  251 

it  is  necessary  for  organized  society  to  have  revenues, 
and  that  therefore  tlie  society  must  take  some  part 
at  least  of  the  property  of  individuals.  The  proposi- 
tion we  admit,  but  the  conclusion  we  deny.  Organ- 
ized society  must  have  revenues ;  but  the  natural 
and  proper  and  adequate  source  of  those  revenues  is 
not  in  what  justly  belongs  to  individuals,  but  in  what 
justly  belongs  to  society  —  the  value  which  attaches 
to  land  with  the  growth  of  society.  Let  the  state 
take  that,  and  there  will  be  no  need  for  it  to  violate 
the  right  of  property  by  taking  what  justly  belongs 
to  the  individual. 

Mr.  Spencer's  admission  in  "  Justice  "  of  the  right 
of  the  state  to  take  from  innividaals  their  property 
by  taxation  —  an  admission  which  makes  impossible 
any  clear  assertion  of  the  right  of  property  —  is  forced 
upon  him  by  the  radical  change  in  his  teachings  that 
his  fear  of  Sir  John  and  his  Grace  has  compelled  him 
to  make.  He  made  no  such  surrender  of  individual 
rights  to  the  state  in  "  Social  Statics."  On  the  con- 
trary he  therg  emphatically  —  though  as  to  details  not 
very  clearly,  for  in  many  things  he  only  saw  men  as 
trees  walking  —  asserts  the  rights  of  the  individual 
as  against  society.  But  in  "  Justice  "  he  is  compelled 
to  admit  the  right  of  the  state  to  take  property  by 
taxation,  because  of  his  desire  to  admit  the  right  of 
land-owners  to  appropriate  the  revenues  which  are 
the  natural  provision  for  the  needs  of  the  state. 

For  the  state  is  natural  and  necessary,  and  the 
state  must  have  revenues.  Hence  any  one  who  does 
not  see,  or  who  chooses  to  deny,  that  the  natural  rev- 
enue of  the  state  is  the  value  which  social  growth 
gives  to  land,  is  compelled  to  admit  that  for  the  pur- 


252  RECANTATION. 

pose  of  obtaining  revenue  the  state  may  take  the 
property  of  individuals,  and  tlius  to  deny  the  right  of 
property. 

Suppose  some  one  to  have  asked  the  Herbert 
Spencer  who  wrote  "  Social  Statics  :  "  "  Where  shall 
the  state  get  its  necessary  revenues  if  it  scrupulously 
observes  the  light  of  property  and  does  not  continue 
to  take  by  force  what  it  needs  of  the  property  of 
individuals  ?  " 

He  would  have  promptly  replied,  for  the  answer  is 
in  that  book,  "  By  taking  through  its  own  agents  for 
its  own  purposes  the  rent  of  land,  which  is  now  taken 
by  the  agents  of  Sir  John  and  his  Grace  for  their 
purposes." 

But  the  Herbert  Spencer  who  now  writes  "  Justice" 
could  find  no  answer  to  such  a  question,  since  he 
writes  for  the  purpose  of  defending  the  appropriations 
of  Sir  John  and  his  Grace.  Hence  he  is  compelled  to 
deny  the  right  of  property  —  justifying  its  appropria- 
tion by  an  agency  which  in  another  place  in  this  same 
book  he  calls  "  the  many-headed  government  appointed 
by  multitudes  of  ignorant  people  ; "  and  which,  in- 
deed, owing  to  the  poverty,  ignorance,  greed  and 
immorality  which  are  the  results  of  ignoring  the  right 
of  property,  is  not  undeserving  of  such  a  contemptuous 
characterization. 

But  that  he  really  knows  better ;  that  he  really 
sees  that  the  taxation  of  the  products  of  labor  is  a 
violation  of  the  right  of  property  which  differs  from 
slavery  only  in  degree ;  and  that  he  is  only  advocat- 
ing it  in  the  interests  of  that  privileged  class  to  gain 
whose  tolerance  now  seems  to  be  his  supreme  ambi- 
tion, is  clearly  shown  further  on  in  this  same  book, 


PROPERTY   AND  TAXATION.  253 

where  in  opposing  what  he  deems  unnecessary  taxa- 
tion he  clearly  states  the  principle  that  condennis  all 
taxation  of  what  belongs  to  individuals.  I  quote 
from  Chapter  XXVI.  of  "Justice,"  "The  Limits  of 
State-duties,"  Section  121,  pp.  222-224: 

If  justice  asserts  the  liberty  of  each  limited  only  by 
the  like  liberties  of  all,  then  the  imposing  of  any  further 
limit  is  unjust ;  no  matter  whether  the  power  imposing 
it  be  one  man  or  a  million  of  men.  ...  In  our  time  the 
tying  of  men  to  the  lands  they  were  born  on,  and  the 
forbidding  any  other  occupations  than  the  prescribed 
ones,  would  be  considered  as  intolerable  aggressions  on 
their  liberties.  But  if  these  larger  inroads  on  their 
rights  are  wrong,  then  also  are  smaller  inroads.  As  we 
hold  that  a  theft  is  a  theft  whether  the  amount  stolen 
be  a  pound  or  a  penny,  so  we  must  hold  that  an  aggres- 
sion is  an  aggression  whether  it  be  great  or  small.  .  .  . 
We  do  not  commonly  see  in  a  tax  a  diminution  of  free- 
dom, and  yet  it  clearly  is  one.  The  money  taken 
represents  so  much  labor  gone  through,  and  the  product 
of  that  labor  being  taken  away,  either  leaves  the  indi- 
vidual to  go  without  such  benefit  as  was  achieved  by  it 
or  else  to  go  through  more  labor.  In  feudal  days,  when 
the  subject  classes  had,  under  the  name  of  corvees,  to 
render  services  to  their  lords,  specified  in  time  or  work, 
the  partial  slavery  was  manifest  enough ;  and  when  the 
services  were  commuted  for  money,  the  relation  remained 
the  same  in  substance  though  changed  in  form.  So  is  it 
now.  Tax-payers  are  subject  to  a  state  corvee,  which  is 
none  the  less  decided  because,  instead  of  giving  their  spe- 
cial kinds  of  work,  they  give  equivalent  sums  ;  and  if  the 
corvee  in  the  original  undisguised  form  was  a  deprivation 
of  freedom,  so  is  it  in  its  modern  disguised  form.  "  Thus 
much  of  your  work  shall  be  devoted,  not  to  your  own  pur- 
poses, but  to  our  ])urposes,"  say  the  authorities  to  the  cit- 
izens ;  and  to  whatever  extent  this  is  carried,  to  that 
extent  the  citizens  become  slaves  of  the  government. 

"  But  they  are  slaves  for  their  own  advantage,''  will 
be  the  reply — "and  the  things  to  be  done  with  the 
money  taken  from  them  are  things  which  will  in  one  way 


254  KECANTATION. 

or  other  conduce  to  their  welfare."  Yes,  that  is  the 
theory  —  a  theory  not  quite  in  harmony  with  the  vast 
mass  of  mischievous  legislation  filling  the  statute  books. 
But  this  reply  is  not  to  the  purpose.  The  question  is  a 
question  of  justice ;  and  even  supposing  that  the  benefits 
to  be  obtained  by  these  extra  public  expenditures  were 
fairly  distributed  among  all  who  furnish  funds,  which 
they  are  not,  it  would  still  remain  true  that  they  are  at 
variance  with  the  fundamental  principle  of  an  equi- 
table social  order.  A  man's  liberties  are  none  the  less 
aggressed  upon  because  those  who  coerce  him  do  so 
in  the  belief  that  he  will  be  benefited.  In  thus  impos- 
ing by  force  their  wills  upon  his  will,  they  are  breaking 
the  law  of  equal  freedom  in  his  person  ;  and  what  the 
motive  may  be  matters  not.  Aggression  which  is  flagi- 
tious when  committed  by  one,  is  not  sanctified  when 
committed  by  a  host. 

Thus,  in  the  same  book,   does    Herbert   Spencer 
answer  Herbert  Spencer. 


CHAPTER   XL 

COMPENSATION". 

While  not  needed  in  reply  to  Mr.  Spencer,  for 
his  own  scornful  denial  that  there  is  any  way  in 
which  land  can  equitably  become  private  property 
remains  unanswered  by  him,  the  wide  prevalence  of 
the  idea  that  justice  requires  the  compensation  of 
land-owners  if  their  exclusive  ownership  be  abolished, 
makes  it  worth  consideration ;  the  more  so  as  the 
same  principle  is  involved  in  other  questions,  which 
are  already,  or  may  soon  become,  of  practical  im- 
portance. 

That  this  idea  will  not  bear  examination  Mr.  Spen- 
cer himself  shows,  even  when,  as  now,  he  is  more 
than  willing  to  be  understood  as  accepting  it.  While 
anxious  to  find  some  ground,  any  ground,  for  as- 
suming that  land-owners  are  entitled  to  compensation 
for  something  equal  or  more  than  equal  to  the  value 
of  their  land,  he  nowhere  ventures  to  assert  that  they 
are  entitled  to  compensation  for  their  Imid.  Such  a 
notion  is  too  preposterous  to  be  stated  by  any  one 
who  has  ever  realized  the  relation  of  men  to  land. 

Yet  to  those  who  have  not,  it  seems  at  first  most 
reasonable,  for  it  accords  with  accustomed  ideas.  If 
it  were  ever  customary  for  primitive  man  to  eat  his 
grandmother,  as  the  Synthetic  Philosophy  would  lead 
us  to  suppose,  she  must  have  been  thought  a  wicked 


256  EECANTATION. 

old  woman  who  without  compensation  to  the  would-be 
eater  tried  to  avoid  that  fate.  In  a  comnumity  such 
as  Edmond  About  pictured  in  his  ■•'  King  of  the 
Mountain,"  where  brigandage  was  looked  on  as  a 
most  respectable  business,  the  captive  who  tried  to 
escape  without  ransom  would  be  deemed  a  violator  of 
his  captors'  rights.  And  many  a  man  now  living  can 
appreciate  Mark  Twain's  portrayal  of  the  pangs  of 
conscience  felt  by  Huckleberry  Finn  as  he  thought 
that  in  not  denouncing  his  negro  companion  he  was 
helping  to  rob  a  poor  widow. 

The  habitual  confusion  of  thought  where  violations 
of  property  have  long  been  treated  by  custom  and  law 
as  propert}',  requires  time  and  effort  to  escape  from, 
and  while  justice  is  yet  struggling  for  recognition 
there  is  with  many  a  desire  to  compromise  between 
the  right  that  ought  to  be  and  the  wrong  that  is. 
Thus  there  are  to-day,  in  England  at  least,  even 
among  those  who  to  some  extent  have  become  con- 
scious of  the  injustice  of  denying  the  equal  right  to 
the  use  of  land,  many  who  think  that  before  this 
natural  right  can  be  equitably  asserted  present  land- 
owners must  be  compensated  for  their  loss  of  legal 
rights. 

This  idea  does  not  apply  to  the  land  question 
alone.  It  was  carried  out  in  England  in  the  com- 
pensation paid  to  West  India  slave-owners  on  the 
abolition  of  slavery ;  in  the  compensation  paid  to  the 
owners  of  rotten  Irish  boroughs  at  the  time  of  the 
Union  for  the  loss  of  their  power  to  sell  legislation ; 
in  the  capitalization  of  hereditary  pensions;  and  in 
the  compensation  paid  to  their  holders  when  profitable 
sinecures  are  abolished. 


COMPENSATION.  257 

Nor  are  we  without  examples  of  the  same  idea 
in  the  United  Ptates.  It  is  often  contended  that  it 
would  be  wrong  to  abolish  protective  duties  where 
capital  has  been  invested  on  the  expectation  of  their 
continuance ;  and  not  many  years  since,  even  in  the 
North,  good,  honest  people, so  far  awake  to  the  crime 
of  slavery  that  they  deemed  the  original  enslavement 
of  a  man  wickedness  so  atrocious  as  to  merit  death  — 
which  indeed  was  the  penalty  denounced  by  our  laws 
against  engaging  in  the  external  slave  trade  —  really 
believed  that  slave-owners  must  be  compensated  be- 
fore existing  slavery  could  be  justly  abolished.  Even 
after  the  war  had  fairly  begun,  this  idea  was  so  strong 
that  the  nation  compensated  owners  when,  in  1862, 
slavery  was  abolished  in  the  District  of  Columbia, 
and  subsequent  efforts  to  apply  the  same  principle  to 
the  slave  States  that  adhered  to  the  Union  were  only 
defeated  by  the  opposition  to  any  national  interfer- 
ence with  slavery. 

Let  us  see  clearly  what  this  question  of  compensa- 
tion is : 

It  does  not  involve  the  validity  of  any  contract 
or  agreement  or  promise  formally  made  by  the  state. 
This  does  not  exist  and  is  not  pleaded  by  the  advo- 
cates of  compensation  in  the  cases  we  are  considering. 
If  it  did,  the  question  would  arise  how  far  legisla- 
tive power  may  bind  legislative  power,  and  one  gen- 
eration control  the  action  of  succeeding  generations. 
But  it  is  not  necessary  to  discuss  that  here. 

It  is  not  a  question  of  all  right  of  compensation. 
That  the  state  should  compensate  when  it  destroys  a 
building  to  make  way  for  a  public  improvement,  or 
takes  goods  or  provisions  or  horses  or  shipping  for 


258  RECANTATION. 

which  it  may  have  sudden  need,  or  demands  of  some 
citizens  services  which  it  does  not  demand  of  others, 
is  not  in  question.  The  right  of  compensation  in 
such  cases  is  not  disputed. 

That  is  to  say  it  is  not  a  question  whether  the 
state  should  pay  for  its  destruction  of  property  having 
moral  sanction,  for  the  assertion  of  moral  sanction  in- 
volves the  right  of  compensation.  Where  the  right 
of  compensation  itself  becomes  the  issue  is  only  where 
the  want  of  moral  sanction  in  the  property  in  question 
is  conceded. 

Thus  the  belief  in  the  rightfulness  of  compensation 
for  the  abolition  of  slavery  bore  no  determining  part 
in  the  minds  of  those  who  believed  in  the  rightfulness 
of  slavery.  The  pro-slavery  men,  who  asserted  that 
slavery  was  of  God's  ordinance,  that  it  was  the  nat- 
ural right  and  duty  of  the  stronger  to  enslave  the 
weaker  so  they  might  paternally  care  for  them,  who 
insisted  not  merely  that  slavery  ought  not  to  be  abol- 
ished where  it  existed,  but  that  it  ought  to  be 
extended  where  it  did  not  exist,  were  not  affected 
by  belief  in  the  rightfulness  of  compensation.  That 
slave-owners  ought  to  be  compensated  if  slavery  was 
abolished  followed  from  their  assertion  that  slavery 
was  right  and  ought  not  to  be  abolished.  It  was  only 
in  the  minds  of  those  who  had  come  to  think  that 
slavery  was  wrong  and  ought  to  be  abolished,  that  the 
idea  that  slave-holders  must  be  compensated  assumed 
importance,  and  became  the  pivotal  question. 

So  as  to  land.  The  idea  of  compensation  is  raised 
and  has  importance  only  where  it  serves  as  a  sec- 
ondary defence  of  private  property  in  land.  If  a  man 
believes  in  private  property  in  land  it   is   needless 


COMPENSATION.  259 

to  address  to  him  any  argument  for  the  necessity  of 
compensation  on  its  al)olition.  He  does  not  believe 
in  its  abolition,  but  in  its  continuance  and  extension  ; 
and  as  the  greater  includes  the  less,  he  alread}'^  believes 
in  the  necessity  of  compensation  if  it  be  abolished. 
But  if  he  has  come  to  doubt  its  justice  and  to  favor  its 
abolition,  then  the  raising  of  the  question  of  compen- 
sation, as  though  it  were  a  new  and  separate  moral 
question,  ma}-  serve  the  purpose  of  a  second  embank- 
ment or  second  ditch  in  military  defence,  and  prevent 
him  from  advocating  abolition,  or  at  least  abolition 
that  would  cause  any  loss  to  vested  interests.  And 
the  intermediate  character  of  this  defence  of  vested 
wrong  gives  it  of  course  great  attractions  for  those 
timid  and  prudent  souls  who  when  moral  right  comes 
in  conflict  with  powerful  interests  like  to  keep  out  of 
the  battle. 

Thus  the  idea  of  compensation  with  which  we  are 
concerned  is  the  idea  of  compensation  for  the  abolition 
of  something  in  itself  conceded  to  be  wrong.  Yet  it 
is  based  on  moral  grounds,  and  raises  what  is  purely 
a  moral  question. 

Those  who  assert  this  necessity  of  compensation 
for  the  abolition  of  what  in  itself  they  concede  to  be 
wrong  contend  that  the  state  has  incurred  a  moral  ob- 
ligation by  its  previous  acquiescence.  They  say  that 
while  it  would  be  right  for  it  to  refuse  such  acquies- 
cence in  the  first  place  —  as  to  prohibit  slavery  where 
it  does  not  yet  exist ;  to  refrain  from  making  private 
property  of  new  land;  to  refuse  to  grant  new  pen- 
sions or  impose  new  protective  duties  or  grant  new 
special  privileges  —  yet  v/here  it  has  already  done 
such  things  the  state  is  morally  bound  to  those  who 


260  RECANTATION. 

have  accepted  its  action ;  and  for  it  to  destroy  the 
value  of  property  already  acquired  under  its  sanction 
would  be  in  the  nature  of  a  retroactive  law. 

But  in  this  there  is  evident  confusion.  If  it  were 
proposed  that  the  state  should  undo  what  has  already 
been  done  under  its  sanction  —  as,  for  instance,  that 
it  should  declare  invalid  titles  to  the  proceeds  of  slave 
labor  already  rendered,  and  give  the  slaves  legal 
claim  for  previous  services ;  or  if  it  should  call  on  the 
beneficiaries  of  protective  tariffs  for  profits  they  had 
already  acquired  —  then  this  reasoning  might  have 
weisfht.  But  it  is  not  retroactive  to  declare  that  for 
the  future  the  labor  of  the  slave  shall  belong  to  him- 
self, nor  that  for  the  future  trade  shall  be  free.  To 
demand  compensation  for  action  of  this  kind  is  to  as- 
sert, not  that  the  state  must  be  bound  by  what  it  has 
already  done,  but  that  what  it  has  already  done  it  is 
morall}^  bound  to  continue  to  do. 

The  loss-  for  which  compensation  is  in  such  cases 
asked  is  not  the  loss  of  a  value  in  hand,  but  the  loss  of 
an  expectation.  The  value  of  a  bale  of  cotton  is  an 
actual  existing  value,  based  on  work  done.  But  the 
value  of  a  slave  is  not  actual,  but  prospective ;  it  is 
not  based  on  work  done,  but  on  the  expectation  that 
the  state  will  continue  to  compel  him  to  work  for  his 
owner.  So  the  value  of  a  house  or  other  improve- 
ment represents  the  present  value  of  the  labor  thus 
embodied.  But  the  value  of  land  itself  represents 
merely  the  value  of  the  expectation  that  the  state  will 
continue  to  permit  the  holder  to  appropriate  a  value 
belonging  to  all.  Now,  is  the  state  called  on  to  com- 
pensate men  for  the  failure  of  their  expectations  as  to 
its  action,  even  where  no  moral  element  is  involved? 


COMPENSATION,  261 

If  it  make  peace,  must  it  compensate  those  who  have 
invested  on  the  expectation  of  war.  If  it  open  a 
shorter  highway,  is  it  morally  bound  to  compensate 
those  who  may  lose  by  the  diversion  of  travel  from  the 
old  one  ?  If  it  promote  the  discovery  of  a  cheap  means 
of  producing  electricity  directly  from  heat,  is  it  mor- 
ally bound  to  compensate  the  owners  of  all  the  steam 
engines  thereby  thrown  out  of  use  and  all  who  are  en- 
gaged in  making  them  ?  If  it  develop  the  air-ship, 
must  it  compensate  those  Avhose  business  would  be 
injured?  Such  a  contention  would  be  absurd.  Yet 
the  contention  we  are  considering  is  worse.  It  is 
that  the  state  must  compensate  for  disappointing  the 
expectations  of  those  who  have  counted  on  its  contin- 
uing to  do  wrong. 

When  the  state  abolishes  slavery  or  hereditary 
pensions  or  protective  duties  or  special  privileges  of 
any  kind,  does  it  really  take  from  the  individuals  who 
thereby  lose,  anything  they  actually  have?  Clearly 
not.  In  the  abolition  of  slavery  it  merely  declines 
for  the  future  to  compel  one  man  to  work  for  another. 
In  the  abolition  of  hereditary  pensions  it  merely  de- 
clines for  the  future  to  take  property  by  force  from 
those  to  whom  it  rightfully  belongs  and  hand  it  over 
to  others.  In  the  abolition  of  protective  duties  it 
merely  declines  for  the  future  forcibly  to  interfere  with 
the  natural  rights  of  all  in  order  that  a  few  may  get 
an  unnatural  profit.  In  the  abolition  of  special  privi- 
leges it  merely  declines  for  the  future  to  use  its  power 
to  give  some  an  advantage  over  others. 

See,  then,  for  what  in  such  cases  compensation  is 
really  asked.  It  is  not  for  any  attempt  to  right  past 
wrongs  ;  it  is  for  refusing  to  do  wrong  in  future.     It 


262  KECANTATION. 

is  not  for  the  unequal  treatment  of  individuals ;  it  is 
for  refusal  to  continue  unequal  treatment.  That  there 
may  be  a  loss  of  salable  value  to  individuals  in  this 
refusal  is  true.  But  it  is  not  a  loss  of  anything  they 
now  have ;  it  is  a  loss  of  what  they  expected  to  get. 
It  is  not  a  loss  for  which  these  individuals  can  justly 
demand  compensation  or  the  state  can  justly  make 
compensation.  It  is  a  loss  of  the  kind  that  the  sil- 
versmitlis  of  Ephesus  sustained  from  Paul's  preach- 
ing; a  loss  of  the  kind  that  comes  to  liquor-sellers 
from  the  spread  of  a  temperance  movement ;  a  loss  of 
the  kind  that  falls  on  some  individuals  with  every 
beneficial  invention  and  every  public  improvement. 
Such  demand  for  compensation  is  a  denial  of  any  right 
of  reform.  It  involves  the  idea  that  the  state,  having 
once  done  wrong,  is  morally  bound  to  continue  it  — 
not  merely  that  it  must  continue  to  do  wrong  or 
else  compensate ;  but  that  it  must  continue  to  do 
wrong  anyhow. 

For  compensation  implies  equivalence.  To  com- 
pensate for  the  discontinuance  of  a  wrong  is  to  give 
those  who  profit  by  the  wrong  the  pecuniary  equiv- 
alent of  its  continuance.  Now  the  state  has  nothing 
that  does  not  belong  to  the  individuals  who  compose  it. 
What  it  gives  to  some  it  must  take  from  others.  Ab- 
olition watli  compensation  is  therefore  not  really  abo- 
lition, but  continuance  under  a  different  form  —  on 
one  side  of  unjust  deprivation,  and  on  the  other  side 
of  unjust  appropriation.  When  on  the  abolition  of  a 
hereditary  pension  tlie  holder  is  compensated,  he  re- 
ceives in  money  or  bonds  a  sum  calculated  to  yield  him 
in  interest  the  same  power  of  annually  commanding 
the  labor  of  others  that  the  pension  gave.     So  compen- 


COMPENSATION.  263 

satioii  for  the  selling  value  of .  a  slave,  which  disap- 
pears on  the  refusal  of  the  community  longer  to 
force  him  to  work  for  the  master,  means  the  giving 
to  the  master  of  what  the  power  to  take  the  property 
of  the  slave  may  be  worth.  What  slave-owners  lose 
is  the  power  of  taking  the  property  of  the  slaves 
and  their  descendants  ;  and  what  they  get  is  an  agree- 
ment that  the  government  will  take  for  their  ben- 
efit and  turn  over  to  them  an  equivalent  part  of  the 
property  of  all.  The  robbery  is  continued  under 
another  form.  What  it  loses  in  intention  it  gains  in 
extension.  If  some  before  enslaved  are  partially 
freed,  others  before  free  are  partially  enslaved. 

That  confusion  alone  gives  plausibility  to  the  idea 
of  compensation  for  refusal  to  continue  wrong,  is  seen 
in  the  fact  that  such  claims  are  never  put  forward  in 
behalf  of  the  original  beneficiaries  of  the  wrong,  but 
always  in  behalf  of  purchasers.  Sometimes  the  con- 
fusion is  that  of  direct  substitution.  Thus  it  is  some- 
times said,  "  Here  is  a  man  who,  presuming  on  the 
continued  consent  of  the  state,  invests  his  earnings 
in  property  depending  on  that  consent.  If  the  state 
withdraws  its  consent,  does  it  not,  unless  it  compen- 
sates him,  destroy  the  products  of  his  liard  labor?  " 

The  answer  is  clear :  It  does  not.  Let  the  property 
be,  for  instance,  a  slave.  What  the  state  destroys  in 
abolishing  slavery  is  not  what  may  have  been  given 
for  the  slave,  but  the  value  of  the  slave.  That  the 
purchaser  got  by  honest  work  what  he  exchanged 
for  the  slave  is  not  in  point.  He  is  not  injured  as 
laborer,  but  as  slave-owner.  If  he  had  not  exchanged 
his  earnings  for  the  slave  the  abolition  of  slavery  would 
have  caused  him  no  loss.     When  a  man  exchanges 


264  RECANTATION. 

property  of  one  kind  for  property  of  another  kind  he 
gives  up  the  one  with  all  its  incidents  and  takes  in  its 
stead  the  other  with  its  incidents.  He  cannot  sell 
bricks  and  buy  hay,  and  then  complain  because  the  hay 
burned  when  the  bricks  would  not.  The  greater  lia- 
bility of  the  hay  to  burn  is  one  of  the  incidents  he 
accepted  in  buying  it.  Nor  can  he  exchange  property 
having  moral  sanction  for  property  having  only  legal 
sanction,  and  claim  that  the  moral  sanction  of  the 
thing  he  sold  attaches  now  to  the  thing  he  bought. 
That  has  gone  with  the  thing  to  the  other  party  in 
the  exchange.  Exchange  transfers,  it  cannot  create. 
Each  party  gives  up  what  right  he  had  and  takes  what 
right  the  other  party  had.  The  last  holder  obtains 
no  moral  right  that  the  first  holder  did  not  have. 

"  But,"  it  may  be  said,  "  the  purchaser  of  what  has 
been  long  treated  as  property  stands  in  a  different 
position  from  the  original  holder.  In  our  adminis- 
tration of  justice  between  man  and  man,  this  differ- 
ence between  the  wrongful  appropriator  and  the 
innocent  purchaser  is  recognized,  and  long  possession 
is  held  to  cure  defects  of  original  title.  This  prin- 
ciple ought  to  be  recognized  by  the  state  in  dealing 
with  individuals,  and  hence  when,  even  by  omission, 
it  deprives  innocent  purchasers  of  wliat  has  long  been 
held  as  property  it  ought  to  compensate  them." 

Innocent  purchasers  of  what  involves  wrong  to 
others  !  Is  not  the  phrase  absmxl  ?  If  in  our  legal 
tribunals,  "  ignorance  of  the  law  excuseth  no  man," 
liow  much  less  can  it  do  so  in  the  tribunal  of  morals 
—  and  it  is  this  to  which  compensationists  aj^peal. 

And  innocence  can  oiily  shield  from  the  punishment 
due  to  conscious  wrong ;  it  cannot  give  right.     If  you 


COMPENSATION.  265 

innocently  stand  on  my  toes,  you  may  fairly  ask  me 
not  to  be  angry ;  but  you  gain  no  right  to  continue 
to  stand  on  them.  Now  in  merely  abolishing  property 
that  involves  wrong,  the  state  imposes  no  penalty,  it 
does  not  even  demand  recompense  to  those  who  have 
been  wronged.  In  this  it  is  more  lenient  than  the 
principles  on  which  we  administer  justice  between 
man  and  man.  For  they  would  require  the  innocent 
purchaser  of  what  belonged  to  another  to  make  resti- 
tution, not  only  of  the  thing  itself,  but  of  all  that  had 
been  received  from  it.  Nor  does  the  principle  of 
market  overt,  which  gives  to  the  purchaser  of  cer- 
tain tilings  openly  sold  in  certain  places,  possession 
even  against  the  rightful  owner  unless  he  proves 
fraud ;  nor  the  principle  of  statutes  of  limitation, 
which  refuses  to  question  ownersliip  after  a  certain 
lapse  of  time,  deny  this  general  principle. 

The  principle  of  "market  overt"  is,  not  that  pas- 
sage from  liand  to  hand  gives  ownership,  but  that 
there  are  certain  things  so  constantly  passing  from 
hand  to  hand  by  simple  transfer  that  the  interests 
of  commerce  and  the  general  convenience  are  best 
served  by  assuming  possession  to  be  conclusive  of 
ownersliip  where  wrongful  intent  cannot  be  proved. 
The  principle  of  statutes  of  limitation  is  not  that 
mere  length  of  possession  gives  ownership,  but  that 
past  a  certain  point  it  becomes  impossible  certainly  to 
adjudicate  disputes  between  man  and  man.  This  is 
one  of  the  cases  in  which  human  law  must  admit  its 
inadequacy  to  more  than  roughly  enforce  the  dictates 
of  the  moral  law.  No  scheme  of  religion  and  no 
theory  of  morals  would  hold  him  blameless  who  relied 
on   a  statute  of  limitations  to  keep  what  he  knew 


266  RECANTATION. 

belonged  morally  to  another.  But  legal  machinery 
cannot  search  into  the  conscience,  it  can  only  inquire 
into  the  evidence ;  and  the  evidence  of  things  past  is 
to  human  perceptions  quickly  dimmed  and  soon 
obliterated  by  the  passage  of  time.  So  that  as  to 
things  whose  ownership  must  depend  on  what  was 
done  in  the  past,  it  is  necessary,  to  avoid  intermin- 
able disputes,  that  the  state  should  set  some  limit 
beyond  which  it  will  not  inquire,  but  will  take  pos- 
session as  proof  of  ownership. 

In  our  ordinary  use  of  words  everything  subject  to 
ownership  and  its  incidental  rights  is  accounted 
property.  But  there  are  two  species  of  property, 
which,  though  often  ignorantly  or  wantonly  con- 
founded, are  essentially  different  and  diametrically 
opposed.  Both  may  be  alike  in  having  a  selling  value 
and  being  subject  to  transfer.  But  things  of  the  one 
kind  are  true  property,  having  the  sanction  of  natural 
right  and  moral  law  independently  of  the  action  of 
the  state,  while  things  of  the  other  kind  are  only 
spurious  projDerty,  their  maintenance  as  property  re- 
quiring the  continuous  exertion  of  state  power,  the 
continuous  exercise  or  threat  of  its  force,  and  involv- 
ing a  continuous  violation  of  natural  right  and  moral 
law.  To  things  of  the  one  kind  the  reasonable  prin- 
ciple of  statutes  of  limitation  properly  applies ;  for, 
being  in  their  nature  propert}^  any  question  of  their 
ownership  is  not  a  question  of  general  right,  but  only 
a  question  of  transactions  between  man  and  man  in 
the  past.  But  to  things  of  the  other  kind,  and  as 
between  the  individual  and  the  state,  this  principle 
does  not  and  cannot  apply,  for  holding  their  character 
as  property  only  from  the  action  of  the  state,  that 


COMPENSATION.  2G7 

character  is  gone  the  moment  the  state  withdraws  its 
support.  The  question  whether  this  support  shall  or 
shall  not  be  withdrawn  is  not  a  question  of  what  was 
done  in  the  past,  but  of  what  shall  be  done  in  the 
future  —  a  question  of  general  rights,  not  a  question 
between  individuals.  Things  which  are  brought  into 
existence  by  the  exertion  of  labor,  and  to  which  the 
character  of  property  attaches  from  their  origin  as 
an  extension  of  the  right  of  the  man  to  himself, 
are  property  of  the  first  kind.  Special  privileges  by 
which  the  state  empowers  and  assists  one  man  in 
taking  the  proceeds  of  another's  labor,  are  property 
of  the  second  kind. 

A  question  of  the  ownership  of  a  coat,  a  tool,  a 
house,  a  bale  of  goods,  is  a  question  of  the  ownership 
of  the  concrete  results  of  past  labor.  We  know  from 
the  nature  of  the  thing  that  it  must  be  owned  by 
somebody,  but  after  lapse  of  time  we  cannot  from  the 
weakness  of  human  powers  undertake  in  case  of  dis- 
pute to  determine  who  that  may  be  ;  and  hence,  refus- 
ing to  inquire  so  far  back,  we  assume  the  right 
to  be  in  the  possessor,  of  which  we  have  at  least  pre- 
sumptive evidence.  But  a  question  of  the  mainten- 
ance or  abolition  of  slavery  or  private  property  in 
land,  of  the  continuance  or  non-continuance  of  a  trade 
monopoly,  a  hereditary  pension,  or  a  protective  duty, 
is  a  question  whether  the  state  shall  or  shall  not  in 
the  future  lend  its  power  for  the  wrongful  appropria- 
tion of  the  results  of  labor  yet  to  be  performed. 
There  is  in  this  no  place  for  the  principle  of  statutes 
of  limitations.  No  indistinctness  as  to  the  past  can 
affect  the  decision.  It  is  not  a  question  of  what  has 
been  done  in  the  past,  but  of  what  shall  be  done  in  the 


268  RECANTATION. 

future.  And  so  far  from  the  presumption  being  that 
the  possessor  of  this  species  of  property  is  entitled  to 
it,  the  moral  certainty  is  the  other  way. 

Again  it  is  said,  "  Here  is  a  man  who  invests  in  a 
slave  and  another  who  invests  in  a  building,  both  being 
alike  recognized  as  property  by  the  state.  The  state 
by  refusing  longer  to  give  its  former  sanction  destroys 
the  value  of  one  investment  while  the  other  continues 
profitable.  Have  not  these  two  men  been  treated 
with  inequality,  which  in  justice  should  be  remedied 
by  compensation?  If  there  was  a  wrong  involved  in 
the  one  species  of  property,  was  it  not  a  wrong  of  which 
by  state  sanction  all  were  guilty?  Is  it  just  therefore 
that  those  who  have  happened  to  invest  in  it  should 
bear  the  whole  loss  ?  " 

To  other  confusions  there  is  here  added  confusion 
as  to  the  relation  between  the  state  and  its  members. 
If  the  maintenance  b}''  the  state  of  a  species  of  property 
that  involves  wrong  is  to  be  considered  as  the  action 
of  all  its  members,  even  of  those  who  suffer  by  it,  so 
must  the  resolve  of  the  state  to  do  so  no  longer  be 
considered  as  the  resolvB  of  all,  even  of  those  who 
relatively  lose  by  it.  If  the  one  cannot  demand 
recompense,  how  can  the  others  demand  compensa- 
tion? 

Passing  this,  the  moral  law  appealed  to  in  the  de- 
mand for  compensation  must  be  the  moral  law  that 
binds  individuals.  Now  the  moral  law  cannot  sanc- 
tion immorality.  It  must  hold  as  void  even  a  spe- 
cific contract  to  do  wrong.  But  in  the  cases  we  are 
considering  there  is  no  contract.  The  claim  is  merely 
that  the  state  by  its  wrongful  action  having  given  rise 
to  the  expectation  that  it  would  continue  such  wrong- 


COJIPENSATION.  269 

fill  action,  is  morally  bound,  should  it  decline  to  do 
so,  to  compensate  those  who  have  invested  in  tliis 
expectation.  AVould  such  a  claim  liold  as  between 
individuals?  If,  for  instance,  I  have  been  accustomed 
to  spend  my  earnings  in  a  gambling-house  or  rum-shop 
till  the  proprietor  has  come  to  count  on  me  as  a  source 
of  regular  profit,  am  I  morally  bound  to  compensate 
him  if  I  stop?  Or  if  an  innocent  purchaser  lias 
bought  the  business  on  the  expectation  that  I  would 
continue,  does  that  bind  me  to  compensate  him  ? 

Consider  further :  If  a  moral  right  of  property  is 
created  bv  the  acquiescence  of  the  state  in  a  wrong- 
then  it  must  be  morally  binding  on  all.  If  the  state 
would  violate  the  moral  law  in  abolishing  slavery 
without  compensation,  so  would  the  slave  violate  the 
moral  law  in  attempting  to  escape  witliout  first  com- 
pensating his  master,  and  so  would  every  one  who 
aided  him,  even  with  a  cup  of  cold  water.  This  was 
actually  held  and  taught  and  enacted  into  law  in  the 
United  States  previous  to  the  war,  and  with  reference 
to  the  white  slaves  of  Great  Britain  is  held  and  taught 
by  the  foremost  men  and  journals  of  that  country, 
who  declare  that  for  the  masses' even  by  strictly  legal 
forms  to  resume  their  natural  rights  in  the  land  of 
their  birth,  without  compensation  to  present  legal 
owners,  would  be  a  violation  of  the  Ten  Command- 
ments ! 

That  the  state  is  not  an  individual,  but  is  composed 
of  individual  members  all  of  whom  must  be  affected 
by  its  action,  is  the  reason  why  its  legitimate  sphere 
is  that  of  securing  to  those  members  equal  rights. 
This  is  the  equality  which  it  is  bound  to  secure,  not 
equality  in   the   results   of  individual   actions;  and 


270  RECANTATION. 

whoever  chooses  to  invest  on  the  presumption  of  its 
denial  of  equal  rights  does  so  at  his  own  risk.  He 
cannot  ask  that,  to  secure  equality  of  profits  between 
him  and  investors  who  did  not  take  this  risk,  the  state 
should  continue  to  deny  equality  of  rights.  It  is  the 
duty  of  the  state  to  secure  equality  of  rights,  not  to 
secure  equality  of  profits. 

Of  the  investments  of  all  kinds  constantly  being 
made  under  the  equal  sanction  of  the  state  some  re- 
sult in  loss  and  some  in  gain.     Supposing  it  to  be- 
asked,  "  Why  should  not  the  state  secure  equality  by 
compensating  those  who  lose  ?  " 

The  answer  would  be  quick  and  clear.  It  is  not 
the  business  of  the  state  to  secure  investors  from  loss, 
and  it  would  be  grossl}-  unjust  for  it  to  attempt  to  do 
.so.  For  this  would  be  to  compel  those  who  had  made 
good  investments  to  make  up  the  losses  of  those  who 
had  made  bad  ones.  It  would  be  to  take  from  pru- 
dence and  care  their  natural  reward  and  make  them 
bear  the  losses  of  recklessness  and  waste ;  to  punish 
forethought,  to  put  a  premium  on  ignorance  and  ex- 
travagance, and  quickly  to  impoverish  the  richest 
community. 

But  would  it  not  be  even  more  unjust  and  unwise 
for  the  state  to  compensate  those  who  up  to  the  last 
moment  had  held  and  bought  property  involving 
wrong,  thus  compelling  those  who  had  refrained  from 
holding  and  buying  it  to  n)ake  up  their  losses?  Is 
it  true  that  the  acquiescence  of  the  state  in  a  wrong 
of  this  kind  proves  it  equally  the  wrong  of  all  ?  Did 
that  part  of  the  community  consisting  of  slaves  ever 
acquiesce  in  slavery?  Did  the  men  who  were  robbed 
of  their  natural  rights  in  land  ever  really  acquiesce  ? 


COMPENSATION.  271 

Are  not  siicli  wrongs  always  instituted  in  the  first 
place  by  those  who  by  force  or  cunning  gain  control 
of  the  state?  Are  they  not  maintained  by  stifling 
liberty,  by  corrupting  morals  and  confusing  thought 
and  buying  or.  gagging  the  teachers  of  religion  and 
of  ethics?  Is  not  any  movement  for  the  abolition  of 
such  wrongs  always  and  of  necessity  preceded  by  a 
long  agitation  in  which  their  injustice  is  so  fully  de- 
clared that  whoever  does  not  wilfully  shut  his  eyes 
may  see  it? 

"  Caveat  emptor  "  is  the  maxim  of  the  law  —  "  Let 
the  buyer  beware!"  If  a  man  buys  a  structure  in 
which  the  law  of  gravity  is  disregarded  or  mechanical 
laws  ignored  he  takes  the  risk  of  those  laws  asserting 
their  sway.  And  so  he  takes  the  risk  in  buying  prop- 
erty which  contravenes  the  moral  law.  When  he 
ignores  the  moral  sense,  when  he  gambles  on  the  con- 
tinuance of  a  wrong,  and  when  at  last  the  general 
conscience  rises  to  the  point  of  refusing  to  continue 
that  wrong,  can  he  then  claim  that  those  who  have 
refrained  from  taking  part  in  it,  those  who  have  suf- 
fered from  it,  those  who  have  borne  the  burden  and 
heat  and  contumely  of  first  moving  against  it,  shall 
share  in  his  losses  on  the  ground  that  as  members  of 
the  same  state  they  are  equally  responsible  for  it? 
And  must  not  the  acceptance  of  this  impudent  plea 
tend  to  prevent  that  gradual  weakening  and  dying 
out  of  the  wrong  v,diich  would  otherwise  occur  as  the 
rise  of  the  moral  sense  against  it  lessened  the  pros- 
pect of  its  continuance ;  and  by  promise  of  insurance 
to  investors  tend  to  maintain  it  in  strength  and  energy 
till  the  last  minute  ? 

Take  slavery.     The  confidence  of  American  slave- 


272  EECANTATION. 

holders,  strengthened  by  the  example  of  Great  Britah', 
that  abolition  would  not  come  without  compensation, 
kept  up  to  the  highest  point  the  market  value  of 
slaves,  even  after  the  guns  that  were  to  free  them 
had  begun  to  sound,  whereas  if  there  had  been  no 
paltering  with  the  idea  of  compensation  the  growth 
of  the  sentiment  against  slavery  would  by  reducing 
the  selling  value  of  slaves  have  gradually  lessened 
the  pecuniary  interests  concerned  in  supporting  it. 

Take  private  property  in  land.  Where  the  expec- 
tation of  future  growth  and  improvement  is  in  every 
advancing  community  a  most  important  element  in 
selling  value,  the  effect  of  the  idea  of  comj^ensation 
will  be  to  keep  up  speculation,  and  thus  to  prevent 
that  lessening  in  the  selling  value  of  land,  that 
gradual  accommodation  of  individuals  to  the  coming 
change,  which  is  the  natural  effect  of  the  growth  of 
the  demand  for  the  recognition  of  equal  rights  to. 
land. 

The  question  we  are  discussing  is  necessarily  a 
moral  question.  Those  who  contend  that  the  state 
is  the  source  of  all  rights  may  indeed  object  to  any 
proposed  state  action  that  it  would  be  inexpedient, 
but  they  cannot  object  that  it  would  be  wrong. 
Nevertheless,  just  as  we  find  the  materialistic  evolu- 
tionists constantly  dropping  into  expressions  which 
imply  purpose  in  nature,  so  do  we  find  deniers  of 
any  higher  law  than  that  of  the  state  vociferous  in 
their  declarations  that  it  would  be  wrong,  or  unjust, 
or  wicked,  for  the  state  to  abolish  property  of  this 
spurious  kind  without  compensation.  The  only  way 
we  can  meet  them  with  any  regard  for  their  profes- 
sions is  to  assume  that  they  do  not  quite  understand 


COMPENSATION.  273 

the  language,  and  that  by  such  expressions  they 
mean  that  it  woukl  bo  inexpedient.  Their  argument, 
I  take  it,  may  be  most  fairly  put  in  tliis  way :  Expe- 
rience has  shown  respect  for  property  rights  to  be 
greatly  conducive  to  the  progress  and  well-being  of 
mankind,  and  all  rights  of  property  resting  (as  they 
assert)  on  the  same  basis,  the  recognition  of  the  state, 
the  destruction  of  a  recognized  right  of  property  by 
action  of  the  state  would  give  a  shock  to  and  cast  a 
doubt  over  all  rights  of  property,  and  thus  work 
injury. 

But  even  if  we  ignore  any  moral  basis,  and  assume 
that  all  rights  of  property  are  derived  from  the  state, 
it  is  still  clear  that  while  some  forms  of  property  do 
conduce  to  the  general  wealth  and  prosperity,  others 
may  be  recognized  by  the  state  that  lessen  the  gen- 
eral wealth  and  impair  the  general  prosperity.  The 
right  of  piracy,  which  at  times  and  places  has  been 
recognized  by  the  state,  does  not  stand  on  the  same 
basis  of  expediency  with  the  right  of  peaceful  com- 
merce. The  right  of  hereditary  jurisdiction,  or  "  the 
right  of  pit  and  gallows  "  as  it  was  called  in  Scotland, 
where  it  was  actually  bought  out  by  the  state  as  a 
piece  of  valuable  property ;  the  right,  long  having  a 
salable  value  in  France,  of  administering  justice ;  the 
right,  at  times  recognized  by  the  state  as  belonging  to 
every  petty  lordling,  of  making  private  war,  of  col- 
lecting local  dues  and  tolls  and  customs,  and  com- 
pelling services  ;  the  right  of  trampling  down  the 
fields  of  the  husbandman  in  the  pursuit  of  game  ; 
the  monopolies  which  made  valuable  privileges  of 
permissions  to  manufacture,  to  trade  and  to  import, 
were  certainly  not  promotive  of  the  general  prosper- 


274  RECANTATION. 

ity.  On  the  contrary  the  general  wealth  and  pros- 
perity have  been  greatly  enhanced  by  their  abolition. 

Even  if  we  grant  that  all  rights  of  property  have 
the  same  basis  and  sanction  and  eliminate  all  moral 
distinction,  reason  and  experience  still  show  that 
there  is  but  one  right  of  property  that  conduces  to 
the  prosperity  of  the  whole  community,  and  that  this 
is  the  right  which  secures  to  the  laborer  the  product 
of  his  labor.  This  promotes  prosperity  by  stimulat- 
ing production,  and  giving  such  security  to  accumu- 
lation as  permits  the  use  of  capital  and  affords  leisure 
for  the  development  of  the  intellectual  powers.  It 
is  respect  for  this,  not  respect  for  those  forms  of 
property  which  the  perversion  or  folly  of  legislative 
power  may  at  times  sanction,  and  which  consist  in 
the  power  of  appropriating  the  results  of  others' 
labor,  that  universal  experience  shows  to  be  essential 
to  the  peace,  prosperity  and  happiness  of  mankind. 

So  far  from  the  destruction  of  those  spurious  and 
injurious  rights  of  property  which  have  wound  aroimd 
the  useful  rights  of  property,  like  choking  weeds 
around  a  fruitful  vine,  being  calculated  to  injure 
that  respect  for  property  on  which  wealth  and  pros- 
perity and  civilization  depend,  the  reverse  is  the 
case.  They  are  not  merely  directly  destructive  of 
what  it  promotes,  but  to  class  them  with  it  and  to 
insist  that  the  respect  due  to  it  is  also  due  to  them  is 
to  give  rise  to  the  belief  that  all  rights  of  property 
are  injurious  to  the  masses.  The  history  of  mankind 
shows  that  the  respect  for  property  which  is  essential 
to  social  well-being  has  never  been  threatened,  sajve 
by  the  growth  of  these  noxious  parasites.  And  this 
to-day  is  the  only  thing  that  threatens  it.     Why  are 


COMPENSATION.  275 

the  socialists  of  to-day  so  hostile  to  capital?  It  is 
for  no  other  reason  than  that  they  confuse  with  what 
is  really  capital  legalized  wrongs  which  enable  the 
few  to  rob  the  raan}^,  by  appropriating  the  products 
of  labor  and  demanding  a  blackmail  for  the  use  of  the 
opportunity  to  labor.  To  teach  that  the  good  and  the 
bad  in  legal  recognitions  are  indistinguishable,  that 
all  that  the  state  may  choose  to  regard  as  property  is 
property,  is  virtually  to  teach  that  pi'operty  is  robbery ! 
And  what  is  this  state,  to  whose  control  by  selfish- 
ness or  ignorance  or  dishonesty  or  corruption  these 
deniers  of  moral  distinctions  would  give  the  power 
of  binding  men  in  the  most  vitally  important  matter 
for  all  future  time  ?  Caligula  was  the  stato.  ^ero 
was  the  state.  Louis  XIV.  truly  said,  "•  Tlie  state, 
it  is  I."  And  according  to  Herbert  Spencer  the 
state  in  England  consists  of  "  a  motley  assemblage  of 
nominees  of  caucuses,  ruled  by  ignorant  and  fanatical 
wire-pullers."  Practically,  the  state  is  always  what 
man,  what  combination,  what  interest,  may  control 
its  machinery.  Hence  the  expediency  of  strictly 
limiting  its  power ;  and,  if  indeed  there  be  no  moral 
principle,  no  higher  law,  that  will  give  us  clear 
guidance  as  to  what  the  state  may  or  may  not  do, 
then  it  becomes  all  the  more  expedient  that  we  carry 
the  principle  of  state  omnipotence  over  rights  to  its 
logical  conclusion,  and  assert  the  power  of  the  state 
in  any  present  or  any  future  time  utterly  to  annul 
any  stipulation,  contract,  regulation  or  institution  of 
the  state  at  an}^  past  time.  If  there  be  no  moral 
right,  no  higher  law,  to  check  the  action  of  the  state, 
then  is  it  all  the  more  needful  that  it  should  be  subject 
at  least  to  the  prospective  clieck  of  sharp  and  com- 


276  EECANTATION. 

plete  reversal.  For  the  more  permanent  and  there- 
fore the  more  vahuible  are  the  special  privileges 
which  the  state  has  power  to  grant,  the  greater  is  the 
inducement  to  selfish  interests  to  gain  control  of  it. 
Nothing  better  calculated  to  corrupt  government  and 
to  strengthen  a  most  dangerous  tendency  of  our  time 
can  well  be  imagined  than  the  doctrine  that  state 
grants  which  enable  one  man  to  take  the  labor  and 
property  of  others  can  never  be  abolished  without 
compensation  to  those  who  may  hold  them. 

Of  different  nature  is  the  plea  sometimes  made, 
that  compensation,  by  disarming  opposition,  is  the 
easiest  and  quickest  way  of  abolishing  a  vested 
wrong.  As  to  this,  not  only  is  compensation  not 
abolition,  not  only  does  its  advocacy  tend  to  keep  in 
full  strength  the  pecuniary  interests  which  are  the 
greatest  obstacles  to  the  reform,  but  it  renders  it  im- 
possible to  arouse  that  moral  force  which  can  alone 
overcome  an  intrenched  wrong.  For  to  say  that  men 
must  be  compensated  if  they  are  prevented  from 
doing  a  thing  is  to  say  that  they  have  a  right  to  do 
that  thing.  And  this  those  who  intelligently  advo- 
cate compensation  know.  Their  purpose  in  advocat- 
ing compensation  is  to  prevent  abolition. 

It  is  sometimes  said  that  it  would  have  been 
cheaper  for  us  to  pay  for  the  Southern  slaves,  as 
Great  Britain  did  in  the  West  Indies,  than  incur  the 
civil  war.  But  the  assumption  that  American  slavery 
might  thus  have  been  got  rid  of  and  the  war  avoided, 
is  far  from  being  true.  An  aristocratic  government, 
such  as  that  of  Great  Britain  in  1832,  may  abolish 
slavery  in  a  few  small  dependencies  by  imposing  the 
burden  on  its  own  people,  but  in  a  popular  govern- 


COMPENSATION.  277 

ment  and  on  a  great  scale  this  cannot  be  done. 
Great  Britain  saved  no  war  by  paying  compensation, 
for  the  West  Indian  planters  could  not  have  fought 
emancipation,  and  if  the  West  Indian  slaves  were 
freed  more  quickly  with  compensation  than  the}^  could 
have  been  without,  it  was  solely  because  the  class 
concerned  in  the  maintenance  of  vested  wrongs  was 
overpoweringly  strong  in  the  British  Parliament. 
With  even  such  representation  as  the  masses  now 
have  it  would  have  been  easier  to  abolish  slavery  in 
the  West  Indies  without  compensation  than  with  it. 
In  the  United  States  abolition  with  compensation 
was  never  a  practical  question,  nor  could  it  have 
become  a  practical  question  until  the  sentiment 
against  slavery  had  reached  even  a  stronger  pitch 
than  that  which  led  to  war.  The  war  came  before 
more  than  a  small  minority  had  seriously  thought  of 
abolishing  slavery,  let  alone  of  paying  for  it ;  before 
either  section  really  dreamed  of  war.  It  came  from 
the  unstable  equilibrium  which  legalized  wrong  be- 
gets, from  the  incidental  issues  and  passions  which 
it  always  arouses  when  the  moral  sense  begins  to 
revolt  against  it,  even  before  the  main  question  is 
reached.  It  came,  not  from  a  demand  for  compen- 
sation on  one  side  and  a  refusal  to  give  it  on  the 
other,  but  from  the  timidity  with  which  the  moral 
question  had  been  treated  by  those  who  really  saw 
the  essential  injustice  of  slavery,  and  which  by  con- 
cessions and  compromises  had  so  strengthened  and 
emboldened  the  slavery  interest  that  in  revolt  at 
measures  far  less  threatening  to  it  than  the  discus- 
sion of  abolition  with  compensation  could  have  been, 
it  flung  the  nation  into  war. 


278  RECANTATION. 

And  even  if  the  alternative  of  compensation  or 
war  had  been  fairly  presented  to  the  American  peo- 
ple, who  shall  say  that  it  would  have  been  really 
wiser  and  cheaper  for  them  to  surrender  to  such  a 
demand  ?  Could  the  Nemesis  that  follows  national 
wrong  have  thus  been  placated  ?  IMight  not  the  car- 
rying out  of  such  a  measure  as  the  compensation  for 
three  million  slaves  have  given  rise  to  political  strug- 
gles involving  an  even  more  disastrous  war?  And 
would  the  precedent  established  in  the  conscious  viola- 
tion of  the  moral  sense  ultimately  have  cost  nothing  ? 
The  cost  of  the  war,  in  blood,  in  Avealth,  in  the  bit- 
terness aroused  and  the  corruptions  of  government 
engendered,  cannot  well  be  estimated  ;  yet  who  cannot 
but  feel  that  the  moral  atmosphere  is  clearer  and  that 
the  great  problems  which  still  beset  the  republic  are 
easier  of  solution  than  if  with  the  alternative  of  com- 
pensation or  war,  like  a  pistol  at  its  head,  the  nation 
had  consciously  and  cravenly  surrendered  to  wrong? 

What  this  plea  for  compensation  amounts  to  is, 
that  it  is  cheaper  to  submit  to  wrong  than  to  stand 
for  right.  Universal  experience  shows  that  whenever 
a  nation  accepts  such  a  doctrine  of  submission  it  loses 
independence  and  liberty  without  even  gaining  peace. 
The  peace  it  will  secure  is  the  peace  that  declining 
Rome  bought  of  the  barbarians,  the  peace  of  fella- 
heen and  Bengalees. 

O 

Even  in  personal  matters  it  is  difficult  to  say  what 
will  be  the  result  of  action  based  on  mere  expediency; 
in  the  larger  and  more  intricate  scale  of  national 
affairs  it  is  impossible.  This  is  why,  as  contended 
by  Mr.  Spencer  in  "  Social  Statics  "  the  course  of 
true  wisdom  in  social  affairs  is  to  follow  the  dictate 


COMPENSATION.  279 

of  principle  —  to  ask,  not  what  seems  to  be  expedient, 
but  what  is  right.  If  a  hiw  or  institution  is  wrong,  if 
its  continuance  involves  the  continuance  of  injustice, 
there  is  but  one  wise  thing  to  do,  as  there  is  but  one 
right  thing,  and  that  is  to  abolish  it. 

To  come  back  to  the  main  question  : 

All  pleas  for  compensation  on  the  abolition  of 
unequal  rights  to  land  are  excuses  for  avoiding  right 
and  continuing  wrong ;  they  all,  as  fully  as  the  origi- 
nal wrong,  deny  that  equalness  which  is  the  essential 
of  justice.  Where  they  have  seemed  plausible  to  any 
honestly-minded  man,  he  will,  if  he  really  examines 
his  thought,  see  that  this  has  been  so  because  he  has, 
though  perhaps  unconsciously,  entertained  a  sympathy 
for  tliose  who  seem  to  profit  by  injustice  which  he  has 
refused  to  those  who  have  been  injured  by  it.  He 
has  been  tlnnking  of  the  few  whose  incomes  would 
be  cut  off  by  the  restoration  of  equal  right.  He  has 
forgotten  the  many,  who  are  being  impoverished, 
degraded,  and  driven  out  of  life  by  its  denial.  If 
he  once  breaks  through  the  tyranny  of  accustomed 
ideas  and  truly  realizes  that  all  men  are  equally  en- 
titled to  the  use  of  the  natural  opportunities  for  the 
living  of  their  lives  and  the  development  of  their 
powers,  he  will  see  the  injustice,  the  wickedness,  of 
demanding  compensation  for  the  abolition  of  the 
monopoly  of  land.  He  will  see  that  if  any  one  is  to 
be  compensated  on  the  abolition  of  a  wrong,  it  is 
those  who  have  suffered  by  the  wrong,  not  those  who 
have  profited  by  it. 

Private  property  in  land  —  the  subjecting  of  land 
to  that  exclusive  ownership  which  rightfully  attaches 
to  the  products  of  labor  —  is  a  denial  of  the  true 


280  KECANTATION^. 

right  of  property,  which  gives  to  each  the  equal  right 
to  exert  his  labor  and  the  exclusive  right  to  its  re- 
sults. It  differs  from  slavery  only  in  its  form,  which 
is  that  of  making  property  of  the  indispensable  nat- 
ural factor  of  production,  while  slavery  makes  prop- 
erty of  the  human  factor  ;  and  it  has  the  same  purpose 
and  effect,  that  of  compelling  some  men  to  work  for 
others.  Its  abolition  therefore  does  not  mean  the 
destruction  of  any  right  but  the  cessation  of  a  wrong 
—  that  for  the  future  the  municipal  law  shall  conform 
to  the  moral  law,  and  that  each  shall  have  his  own. 

I  have  gone  over  this  question  of  compensation  — 
this  "  last  ditch "  of  the  advocates  of  landlordism 
—because  it  is  so  persistently  raised,  not  that  it  arises 
in  anything  I  have  advocated.  We  who  propose  that 
natural  and  therefore  easy  method  of  restoring  their 
equal  rights  to  men,  which  for  the  purpose  of  clearly 
differentiating  it  from  all  schemes  of  land  nationali- 
zation we  call  the  single  tax,  do  not  propose  to  take 
from  land-owners  anything  they  now  have.  We  pro- 
pose to  leave  to  land-owners  whatever  they  actually 
have,  even  though  it  be  in  their  hands  the  fruits  of 
injustice ;  we  propose  not  even  to  change  the  forms 
of  land  tenure,  and  greatly  to  simplify  instead  of 
enlarging  the  machinery  and  functions  of  the  state. 
We  propose,  in  short,  only  so  to  change  present  meth- 
ods of  raising  public  revenues  that  they  shall  conform 
to  the  requirements  of  the  right  of  property,  taking 
for  the  use  of  the  state  that  which  rightfully  belongs 
to  the  state,  leaving  to  individuals  that  which  right- 
fully belongs  to  the  individual. 

But  that  clumsy  mode  of  abolishing  private  prop- 
erty in  land  which  is  properly  called  land  nationali- 


COMPENSATION.  281 

zation  requires  the  taking  of  rightf  al  property  in  the 
improvements  that  have  been  annexed  to  Land.  In 
this  it  calls  for  compensation  in  a  way  that  confusion 
of  thought  may  carry  to  the  ownership  of  land  itself. 
And  even  the  taking  of  land  it  proposes  would  be  in 
form  a  taking  of  property.  The  land  would  have  to 
be  formally  appropriated  by  the  state  and  then  rented 
out.  Now  we  are  accustomed  to  the  compensation 
of  owners  when  particular  portions  of  land  are  taken 
for  the  use  of  the  state,  and  this  indeed  as  I  have 
before  pointed  out  is  rightful,  so  that  it  is  easy  for 
the  superficial  to  think  that  when  the  state  shall  take 
all  the  land  for  the  purpose  of  renting  it  out  again  it 
should  compensate  all  owners.  Thus  the  scheme  of 
land  nationalization  gives  to  the  idea  of  compensation 
a  plausibility  that  does  not  properly  belong  to  it. 

This  is  the  reason  why  in  England,  where  there 
has  been  a  good  deal  of  talk  of  land  nationalization, 
the  notion  of  compensation  is  strong  among  certain 
classes,  while  in  America,  where  the  movement  for 
the  recognition  of  equal  rights  to  the  use  of  land  has 
gone  from  the  beginning  on  the  lines  of  the  single 
tax,  there  is  almost  nothing  of  it,  except  as  a  reflec- 
tion of  English  thought.  And  this  is  the  reason  Avhy, 
although  even  in  England  the  advocates  of  land 
nationalization  are  few  and  Aveak  as  compared  with 
the  great  body  that  is  advancing  on  the  unjust  privi- 
leges of  landlords  by  the  way  of  taxation,  the  English 
advocates  of  landloi-dism  always  endeavor  to  discuss 
tlie  land  question  as  though  the  actual  taking  of  land 
by  the  state  were  the  only  thing  proposed.  It  will 
be  observed  for  instance  that  ]\Ir.  Spencer,  in  "  Jus- 
tice," never  so  much  as  alludes  to  the  proposition  to 


282  RECANTATION. 

secure  equal  rights  in  land  by  taking  land  values,  not 
land.  Yet  he  cannot  be  so  ignorant  of  what  is  going 
on  about  him  as  not  to  know  that  this  is  the  line 
which  the  advance  against  landlordism  is  taking  and 
must  take.  He  ignores  it  because  there  is  on  that 
line  no  place  for  proposing  or  even  suggesting  com- 
pensation. Compensation  to  the  ultimate  payers  of 
a  tax  is  something  unheard  of  and  absurd. 

The  primary  error  of  the  advocates  of  land  nation- 
alization is  in  their  confusion  of  equal  rights  with 
joint  rights,  and  in  their  consequent  failure  to  realize 
the  nature  and  meaning  of  economic  rent  —  errors 
which  I  have  pointed  out  in  commenting  on  Mr. 
Spencer's  declarations  in  "  Social  Statics."  In  truth 
the  right  to  the  use  of  land  is  not  a  joint  or  common 
right,  but  an  equal  right ;  the  joint  or  common  right 
is  to  rent,  in  the  economic  sense  of  the  term.  There- 
fore it  is  not  necessary  for  the  state  to  take  land,  it  is 
only  necessary  for  it  to  take  rent.  This  taking  by 
the  commonalty  of  what  is  of  common  riglit,  would 
of  itself  secure  equality  in  what  is  of  equal  right  — 
for  since  the  liolding  of  land  could  be  profitable  only 
to  the  user,  there  would  be  no  inducement  for  any  one 
to  hold  land  that  he  could  not  adequately  use,  and 
monopolization  being  ended  no  one  who  wanted  to  use 
land  would  have  any  difficulty  in  finding  it.  And  it 
would  at  the  same  time  secure  the  individual  right, 
for  in  taking  what  is  of  common  right  for  its  revenues 
the  state  could  abolish*  all  those  taxes  which  now  take 
from  the  individual  wliat  is  of  individual  right. 

The  truth  is  that  customs  taxes,  and  improvement 
taxes,  and  income  taxes,  and  taxes  on  business  and 
occupations  and  on  legacies  and  successions,  are  mor- 


COMPENSATION.  283 

ally  and  economically  no  better  than  highway  robbery 
or  burglary,  all  the  more  disastrous  and  demoralizing 
because  practised  by  the  state.  There  is  no  necessity 
for  them.  The  seeming  necessity  arises  only  from 
the  failure  of  the  state  to  take  its  own  natural  and 
adequate  source  of  revenue  —  a  failure  which  entails 
a  long  train  of  evils  of  another  kind  by  stimulating  a 
forestalling  and  monopolization  of  land  which  creates 
an  artificial  scarcity  of  the  primary  element  of  life  and 
labor,  so  that  in  the  midst  of  illimitable  natural  re- 
sources the  opportunity  to  work  has  come  to  be 
looked  on  as  a  boon,  and  in  spite  of  the  most  enor- 
mous increase  in  the  powers  of  production  the  great 
mass  find  life  a  hard  struggle  to  maintain  life,  and 
millions  die  before  their  time,  of  over-strain  and 
under-nurture. 

When  the  matter  is  looked  on  in  this  way,  the  idea 
of  compensation  —  the  idea  that  justice  demands  that 
those  who  have  engrossed  the  natural  revenue  of  the 
state  must  be  paid  the  capitalized  value  of  all  future 
engrossment  before  the  state  can  resume  those  rev- 
enues—  is  too  preposterous  for  serious  statement. 

And  while  in  the  nature  of  things  any  change  from 
wrong-doing  to  right-doing  must  entail  loss  upon  those 
who  profit  by  the  wrong-doing,  and  this  can  no  more 
be  prevented  than  can  parallel  lines  be  made  to  meet ; 
yet  it  must  also  be  remembered  that  in  the  nature  of 
things  the  loss  is  merely  relative,  the  gain  absolute. 
Whoever  will  examine  the  subject  will  see  that  in  the 
abandonment  of  the  present  unnatural  and  unjust 
method  of  raising  public  revenues  and  the  adoption 
of  the  natural  and  just  method  even  those  who  rela- 
tively lose  will  be  enormous  gainers. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

"  JUSTICE  "  —  "  THE  LAND  QUESTION." 

While  "  Justice  "  shows  no  decadence  of  intellect- 
ual power,  and  those  who  have  seen  the  utterances  of 
a  great  thinker  in  preceding  volumes  of  the  Synthetic 
Philosophy  will  doubtless  have  as  high  an  opinion  of 
this,  there  is  in  it  everywhere,  as  compared  with 
"Social  Statics,"  the  evidence  of  moral  decadence, 
and  of  that  perplexity  which  is  the  penalty  of  delib- 
erate sacrifice  of  intellectual  honesty.  But  it  were 
wearying,  and  for  our  purpose  needless,  to  review  the 
subsequent  chapters  of  "  Justice,"  and  to  show  the  con- 
tradictions and  confusions  into  which  Mr.  Spencer. 
falls  at  every  turn,i  q^j^^  ^j^q  manner  in  which  he  re- 
cants his  previously  expressed  opinions  on  such  sub- 
jects as  the  political  rights  of  women,  and  even  the 
equal  political  rights  of  men.  To  complete  the  ex- 
amination of  that  cross-section  of  his  teachings  which 
in  the  beginning  I  proposed,  let  us  proceed  to  the 

1  One  of  these  may  be  \Yorth  quoting  as  particularly  interesting 
in  view  of  what  has  gone  before  and  what  is  yet  to  come.  In 
Chapter  XVI.,  "The  Right  of  Gift  and  Bequest,"  pp.  122-124, 
Mr.  Spencer  says  : 

Few  will  deny  that  the  earth's  surface  and  the  things  on  it 
should  be  owned  in  full  by  the  generation  at  any  time  existing. 
Hence  the  right  of  property  may  not  equitably  be  so  interpreted  as 
to  allow  any  generation  to  tell  subsequent  generations  for  what 
purpose  or  luider  what  conditions  they  are  to  use  the  earth's  sur- 
face or  the  things  on  it.  .  .  .  One  who  liolds  land  subject  to  that 
supreme  ownership  of  the  community  which  both  ethics  and  law 
assert,  cannot  rightly  have  such  power  of  willing  the  application 
of  it  as  involves  permanent  alienation  from  the  community. 


"justice"  —  "THE   LAND   QUESTION."         285 

consideration  of  his  very  last  word  on  the  land  ques- 
tion, the  note  to  which  he  refers  the  reader  at  the 
close  of  the  chapter  on  "  The  Rights  to  the  Uses  of 
Natural  Media." 

This  note  is  to  be  found  among  the  appendices  to 
"  Justice,"  which  consist  of  Appendix  A,  "■  The  Kant- 
ian Idea  of  Rights,"  before  referred  to  (page  173) ; 
Appendix  B,  "  The  Land  Question ; "  Appendix  C, 
"  The  Moral  Motive,"  a  reply  to  a  criticism  by  the 
Rev.  J.  Llewelyn  Davis ;  and  Appendix  D,  "  Con- 
science in  Animals,"  which  is  a  collection  of  dog 
stories. 

The  idea  that  for  the  genesis  of  all  there  is  in  man, 
even  his  moral  perceptions,  we  must  look  down,  not 
up,  permeates  the  Synthetic  Philosophy,  seeking  to 
obliterate  the  gulf  between  man  and  other  animals  by 
greedily  swallowing  eyery  traveller's  tale  that  tends 
to  degrade  man  and  every  wonder-monger's  story  that 
ascribes  human  faculties  to  brutes.  Thus  "  Justice  " 
begins  with  "  Animal  Ethics  "  and  ends  with  dog  sto- 
ries, the  appendix  devoted  to  them  being  twice  as 
large  as  that  devoted  to  "  The  Land  Question  "  and 
illustrated  with  diagrams.^ 

^  The  dog  stories  which  close  this  crowning  book  of  the  Syn- 
thetic Philosophy  are  sent  to  Mr.  Spencer  by  Mr.  T.  Mann  Jones, 
of  Devon,  with  this  introduction  : 

Dear  Sir:  The  following  careful  observations  on  animals  other 
than  man,  may  be  of  interest  to  you  as  supporting  your  idea  that 
the  idea  of  "duty"  or  "ought"  (owe  it)  may  be  of  non  "super- 
natural" origin.  "Supernatural"  is  used  in  the  usual  sense, 
without  committing  the  writer  to  any  opinion. 

These  "careful  observations"  are  indorsed  by  Mr.  Spencer  as 
highly  remarkable  and  instructive,  and  as  supporting  his  own  con- 
clusion, and  he  tells  us,  apparently  on  the  faith  of  them,  that  Mr, 
Jones  is  a  careful,  critical  and  trustworthy  observer.    To  give  a 


286  BECAiTTATION. 

These  dog  stories  are,  however,  fit  companions  to 
the  savage  stories  with  which,  by  the  assistance  of 
a  corps  of  readers,  the  volumes  of  the  Syntlietic  Phi- 
losophy are  profusely  embellished.  The  wooden  lit- 
eralness  with  which,  to  suit  himself,  Mr.  Spencer 
interprets  the  imagery  and  metaphor  of  which  the 
language  of  all  peoples  who  come  close  to  nature  is 
full,  is  perhaps  the  most  comical  thing  in  this  un- 
consciously comic  collection.  I  hesitate  to  give  an 
instance,  such  is  the  embarrassment  of  riches ;  but 
here,  to  quote  at  random,  is  one.  It  is  from  the 
chapter  on  "  The  Religious  Idea  "  in  "  Principles  of 
Sociology."  Mr.  Spencer  has  been  showing  to  his 
own  satisfaction,  and  doubtless  to  that  of  the  gentle- 
men who  regard  him  as  greater  than  Aristotle,  how 
from  the  adoption  of  such  family  names  as  Wolf,  and 
the  habit  of  speaking  of  a  strong  man  as  "  a  bear," 
the  less  civilized  peojjles,  whom  he  generically  lumps 
as  "  savages,"  have  come  to  believe  that  their  ances- 
tors passed  into  animals.  He  goes  on  to  show  "  how 
naturally  the  identification  of  stars  with  persons  may 
occur."  Recalling  first,  what  he  declares  to  be  "the 
belief  of  some  North  Americans  that  the  brighter  stars 
in  the  Milky  Way  are  camp-fires  made  by  the  dead 
on  their  way  to  the  other  world,"  this  is  the  fashion 
in  which  he  does  it: 

sample,  here  is  one  of  the  observations,  which  as  it  has  no  dia- 
grams, I  may  quote  as  printed: 

The  '■'■  ought ''"'  may  he  established  as  an  obligation  to  a  higher 
mind  in  opposition  to  the  promptings  of  the  strongest  feelings  of  the 
animal;  e.g.  — 

A  bitch  I  had  many  years  ago  showed  great  pleasure  at  the 
attentions  of  male  dogs,  when  in  season.  I  checked  lier  repeat- 
edly, by  voice  only.  This  set  up  tlio  "  ought  "  so  thoroughly,  that 
though  never  tied  up  at  such  times,  she  died  a  virgin  at  thirteen 
and  a  half  years  old. 


"  JUSTICE  " —  "  THE  LAND   QUESTION."         287 

When  a  sportsman,  hearing  a  shot  in  the  adjacent 
wood,  exclaims,  "  That's  Jones  ! "  he  is  not  supposed  to 
mean  that  Jones  is  the  sound  ;  he  is  known  to  mean  tliat 
Jones  made  the  sound.  But  when  a  savage,  ])ointing  to 
a  particular  star  originally  thought  of  as  the  camp-lire 
of  such  or  such  a  departed  man,  says,  "There  he  is," 
the  children  he  is  instructing  naturally  suppose  him  to 
mean  that  the  star  itself  is  the  departed  man ;  especially 
when  receiving  the  statement  through  an  undeveloped 
language.  — Frinclples  of  Sociolorjy,  Vol.  II.,  page  685. 

"Lo,  the  poor  Indian!  " 

What  would  happen  to  the  beliefs  of  savage  chil- 
di'en  if  their  undeveloped  language  enabled  them 
to  receive  such  information  as  is  often  conveyed 
through  our  developed  language  —  such,  for  instance, 
as  "She's  a  daisy!"  or  "He's  a  brick!"  or  "You 
would  have  to  use  a  pick-axe  to  get  a  joke  through 
his  head  "  ? 

But  I  am  keeping  the  reader  from  "  The  Land 
Question."  This  is,  for  our  purpose  at  least,  the 
most  important  utterance  of  what  its  author  deems 
the  most  important  book  of  the  great  Synthetic 
Evolutionary  Philosophy  —  a  book  that  begins  with 
"Animal  Ethics,"  and  ends  with  dog  stories.  I 
quote  this  appendix  in  full: 

APPENDIX    B. — THE    LAND    QUESTION. 

The  course  of  Nature,  "  red  in  tooth  and  claw,"  has 
been,  on  a  higher  plane,  the  course  of  civilization. 
Through  "  blood  and  iron  "  small  clusters  of  men  have 
been  consolidated  into  larger  ones,  and  these  again  into 
still  larger  ones,  until  nations  have  been  formed.  This 
process,  carried  on  everywhere  and  always  by  brute 
force,  has  resulted  in  a  history  of  wrongs  upon  wrongs  : 
savage  tribes  have  been  slowly  welded  together  by  savage 
means.  We  could  not,  if  we  tried,  trace  back  the  acts 
of  unscrupulous  violence   committed  during  these  thou- 


288  RECANTATION. 

sands  of  years ;  and  could  we  trace  them  back  we  could 
not  rectify  their  evil  results. 

Land-ownership  was  established  during  this  process ; 
and  if  the  genesis  of  land-ownership  was  full  of  iniqui- 
ties, they  were  iniquities  committed  not  by  the  ancestors 
of  any  one  class  of  existing  men  but  by  the  ancestors  of 
all  existing  men.  The  remote  forefathers  of  living 
Englishmen  were  robbers,  who  stole  the  lands  of  men 
who  were  themselves  robbers,  who  behaved  in  like  man- 
ner to  the  robbers  who  preceded  them.  The  usurpation 
by  the  ISTormans,  here  complete  and  there  partial,  was  of 
lands  which,  centuries  before,  had  been  seized,  some  by 
piratical  DaneS  and  Norsemen,  and  some  at  an  earlier 
time  by  hordes  of  invading  Frisians  or  old  English. 
And  then  the  Celtic  owners,  expelled  or  enslaved  by 
these,  had  in  bygone  ages  themselves  expropriated  the 
people  who  lived  in  the  underground  houses  here  and 
there  still  traceable.  What  would  happen  if  we  tried 
to  restore  lands  inequitably  taken  —  if  Normans  had  to 
give  them  back  to  Danes  and  Norse  and  Frisians,  and 
these  again  to  Celts,  and  these  again  to  the  men  who 
lived  in  caves  and  used  flint  implements  ?  The  only 
imaginable  form  of  the  transaction  would  be  a  restor- 
ation of  Great  Britain  bodily  to  the  Welsh  and  the 
Highlanders  ;  and  if  the  Welsh  and  the  Highlanders 
did  not  make  a  kindred  restoration,  it  could  only  be  on 
the  ground  that,  having  not  only  taken  the  land  of  the 
aborigines  but  killed  them,  they  had  thus  justified  their 
ownership ! 

The  wish  now  expressed  by  many  that  land-ownership 
should  be  conformed  to  the  requirements  of  pure  equity, 
is  in  itself  commendable  ;  and  is  in  some  men  prompted 
by  conscientious  feeling.  One  would,  however,  like  to 
hear  from  such  the  demand  that  not  only  here  but  in 
the  various  regions  we  are  peopling,  the  requirements  of 
pure  equity  should  be  conformed  to.  As  it  is,  the  indig- 
nation against  wrongful  appropriations  of  land,  made  in 
the  past  at  home,  is  not  accompanied  by  any  indignation 
against  the  more  wrongful  appropriations  made  at  pres- 
ent abroad.  Alike  as  holders  of  the  predominant  polit- 
ical i)ower  and  as  furnishing  the  rank  and  file  of  our 
armies,  the  masses  of  the  people  are  responsible  for 
those  nefarious  doings  all  over  the  world  which  end  in 


I 


.   "justice" — "THE   LAND   QUESTION."     "     289 

the  seizing  of  new  territories  and  expropriation  of  their 
inhabitants.  The  iilibustering  expeditions  of  the  old 
English  are  repeated,  on  a  vastly  larger  scale,  in  the 
filibustering  expeditions  of  the  new  English.  Yet  those 
who  execrate  ancient  usurpations  utter  no  word  of  pro- 
test against  these  far  greater  modern  usurpations  —  nay, 
are  aiders  and  abetters  in  them.  Remaining  as  they  do 
passive  and  silent  while  there  is  going  on  this  universal 
land-grabbing  which  their  votes  could  stop ;  and  sup- 
plying as  they  do  the  soldiers  who  effect  it ;  they  are 
responsible  for  it.  By  deputy  they  are  committing  in 
this  matter  grosser  and  more  numerous  injustices  than 
were  committed  against  their  forefathers. 

That  the  masses  of  landless  men  should  regard  private 
land-ownership  as  having  been  wrongfully  established,  is 
natural ;  and,  as  we  have  seen,  they  are  not  without 
warrant.  But  if  we  entertain  the  thought  of  rectifica- 
tion, there  arises  in  the  first  place  the  question  — which 
are  the  wronged  and  which  are  the  wrongers  ?  Passing 
over  the  primary  fact  that  the  ancestors  of  existing 
Englishmen,  landed  and  landless,  were,  as  a  body,  men 
who  took  the  land  by  violence  from  previous  owners  ; 
and  thinking  only  of  the  force  and  fraud  by  which  cer- 
tain of  these  ancestors  obtained  possession  of  the  land 
while  others  of  them  lost  possession ;  the  preliminary 
question  is  —  Which  are  the  descendants  of  the  one  and 
of  the  other  ?  It  is  tacitly  assumed  that  those  who  now 
own  lands  are  the  posterity  of  the  usurpers,  and  that 
those  who  now  have  no  lauds  are  the  posterity  of  those 
whose  lands  were  usurped.  But  this  is  far  from  being 
the  case.  The  fact  that  among  the  nobility  there  are 
very  few  whose  titles  go  back  to  the  days  when  the  last 
usurpations  took  place,  and  none  to  the  days  when  there 
took  place  the  original  usurpations ;  joined  with  the 
fact  that  among  existing  land-owners  there  are  fnany 
whose  names  imply  artisan-ancestors ;  show  that  we 
have  not  now  to  deal  with  descendants  of  those  who  un- 
justly appropriated  the  land.  While,  conversely,  the 
numbers  of  the  landless  whose  names  prove  that  their 
forefathers  belonged  to  the  higher  ranks  (numbers  which 
must  be  doubled  to  take  account  of  inter-marriages  with 
female  descendants)  show  that  among  those  who  are  now 
without  land,  many  inherit  the  blood  of  the  land-usurp- 


290  KECANTATION. 

ers.  Hence,  that  bitter  feeling  towards  the  landed  which 
contemplation  of  the  past  generates  in  many  of  the 
landless,  is  in  great  measure  misplaced.  They  are  them- 
selves to  a  considerable  extent  descendants  of  the  sin- 
ners ;  while  those  they  scowl  at  are  to  a  considerable 
extent  descendants  of  the  sinned-against. 

But  granting  all  that  is  said  about  past  iniquities,  and 
leaving  aside  all  other  obstacles  in  the  way  of  an  equi- 
table re-arrangement,  there  is  an  obstacle  which  seems 
to  have  been  overlooked.  Even  supposing  that  the 
English  as  a  race  gained  possession  of  the  land  equita- 
bly, which  they  did  not ;  and  even  supposing  that  exist- 
ing land-owners  are  the  posterity  of  those  who  spoiled 
their  fellows,  which  in  large  part  they  are  not ;  and  even 
supposing  that  the  existing  landless  are  the  posterity  of 
the  despoiled,  which  in  large  part  they  are  not ;  there 
would  still  have  to  be  recognized  a  transaction  that  goes 
far  to  prevent  rectification  of  injustices.  If  we  are  to 
go  back  upon  the  past  at  all,  we  must  go  back  upon  tlie 
past  wholly,  and  take  account  not  only  of  that  which 
the  people  at  large  have  lost  by  private  appropriation  of 
land,  but  also  that  which  they  have  received  in  the  form 
of  a  share  of  the  returns  —  we  must  take  account,  that- 
is,  of  Poor-Law  relief.  Mr.  T.  Mackay,  author  of  The 
English  Poor,  has  kindly  furnished  me  with  the  follow- 
ing memoranda,  showing  something  like  the  total  amount 
of  this  since  the  43d  Elizabeth  (1601)  in  England  and 
Wales. 

Sir  G.  Nicholls  (History  of  Poor  Law,  appendix  to  Vol.  II.) 
ventures  no  estimate  till  1G8S.  At  tliat  date  he  puts  the  poor  rate 
at  nearly  £700,000  a  year.  Till  the  beginning  of  this  century  the 
amounts  are  based  more  or  less  on  estimate. 

1601-1630.                            say  3  millions. 

1631-1700.        (1688  Nicholls  puts  at  700,000.)  30  " 

1701-1720.        (1701  Nicholls  puts  at  900,000.)  20  " 

1721-1760.        (1700  Nicholls  says  1  1-4  millions.)  40  " 

1761-1775.        (1775  put  at  1  1-2  million.)  22  " 

1776-1800.        (1784  2  millions.)  50  " 

1801-1812.        (1803  4  millions;  1813  6  millions.)  65  " 
1813-1840.        (based  on  exact  figures  given  by 

Sir  G.  Nicholls.)  170  " 
1841-1890.       (based  on  Mulhall's  Diet,  of  Sta- 
tistics and  Statistical  Abstract.)  334  " 

734  millions. 


"justice" — "  THE   LAND   QUESTION."         291 

The  above  represents  the  amount  expended  in  relief 
of  the  poor.  Under  the  general  term  "  poor-rate," 
moneys  have  always  been  collected  for  other  purposes  — 
county,  borough,  police  rates,  etc.  The  following  table 
shows  the  annual  amounts  of  these  in  connection  with 
the  annual  amounts  expended  on  the  poor  : 

Total  levied.    Expended  on    Other  purposes 
poor.  balance. 

a-r^       (In  1803.        5,348,000         4,077,000  1,271,000? 


NichoUs. 


1813.        8.646,841         0,656,106  1,990.735? 

1853.        6,522,412         4,939,064  1,583,341  ? 


Total  spent.  Sum  spent. 

Statistical   (  "  1875.       12,694,208         7,488,481  5,205,727 

abstract.     |   "  1889.       15,970,126         8,366,477  7,603,649 

In  addition,  therefore,  to  sums  set  out  in  the  first  table,  there  is  a 
further  sum,  rising  during  the  century  from  1^  to  7i  millions  per 
annum  "  for  other  purposes." 

Mulhall,  on  whom  I  relied  for  figures  between  1853  and  1875, 
does  not  give  "  other  expenditure." 


Of  course  of  the  £734,000,000  given  to  the  poorer 
members  of  the  landless  class  during  three  centuries,  a 
part  has  arisen  from  rates  on  houses  ;  only  such  portion 
of  which  as  is  chargeable  against  ground  rents,  being 
rightly  included  in  the  sum  the  land  has  contributed. 
From  a  land-owner,  avIio  is  at  the  same  time  a  Queen's 
Counsel,  frequeiitly  employed  professionally  to  arbitrate 
in  questions  of  local  taxation,  I  have  received  the 
opinion  that  if,  out  of  the  total  sum  received  by  the  poor, 
£500,000,000  is  credited  to'  the  land,  this  will  be  an 
under-estimate.  Thus  even  if  we  ignore  the  fact  that 
this  amount,  gradually  contributed,  would,  if  otherwise 
gradually  invested,  have  yielded  in  returns  of  one  or 
other  kind  a  far  larger  sum,  it  is  manifest  that  against 
the  claim  of  the  landless  may  be  set  off  a  large  claim  of 
the  landed  —  perhaps  a  larger  claim. 

For  now  observe  that  the  landless  have  not  an  equitable 
claim  to  the  land  in  its  present  state  —  cleared,  drained, 
fenced,  fertilized,  and  furnished  with  farm-buildings, 
etc. — but  only  to  the  land  in  its  primitive  state,  here 
stony  and  there  marshy,  covered  with  forest,  gorse, 
heather,  etc. ;  this  only,  it  is,  which  belongs  to  the  com- 


292  RECANTATION. 

munity.  Hence,  therefore,  the  question  arises  —  What 
is  the  relation  between  tlie  original  "  prairie  value  "  of 
the  land,  and  the  amount  which  the  poorer  among  the 
landless  have  received  during  these  three  centuries  ? 
Probably  the  land-owners  would  contend  that  for  the 
land  in  its  primitive,  unsubdued  state,  furnishing  nothing 
but  wild  animals  and  wild  fruits,  £500,000,000  would  be 
a  high  price. 

"When,  in  Social  Statics,  published  in  1850,  I  drew 
from  the  law  of  equal  freedom  the  corollary  that  the 
land  could  not  equitably  be  alienated  from  the  com- 
munity, and  argued  that,  after  compensating  its  existing 
holders,  it  should  be  re-appropriated  by  the  community, 
I  overlooked  the  foregoing  considerations.  Moreover,  I 
did  not  clearly  see  what  would  be  implied  by  the  giving 
of  compensation  for  all  that  value  which  the  labor  of 
ages  has  given  to  the  land.  While,  as  shown  in  Chapter 
XI.,  I  adhere  to  the  inference  originally  drawn,  that  the 
aggregate  of  men  forming  the  community  are  the  supreme 
owners  of  the  land  —  an  inference  harmonizing  with 
legal  doctrine  and  daily  acted  upon  in  legislation — a 
fuller  consideration  of  the  matter  has  led  me  to  the 
conclusion  that  individual  ownership,  subject  to  state- 
suzerainty,  should  be  maintained. 

Even  were  it  possible  to  rectify  the  inequitable  doings 
which  have  gone  on  during  past  thousands  of  years,  and 
by  some  balancing  of  claims  and  counter-claims,  past 
and  present,  to  make  a  re-arrangement  equitable  in  the 
abstract,  the  resulting  state  of  things  w^ould  be  a  less 
desirable  one  than  the  present.  Setting  aside  all  finan- 
cial objections  to  nationalization  (which  of  themselves 
negative  the  transaction,  since,  if  equitably  effected,  it 
would  be  a  losing  one),  it  suffices  to  remember  the  in- 
feriority of  public  administration  to  private  administra- 
tion, to  see  that  ownership  by  the  state  would  work  ill. 
Under  the  existing  system  of  ownership,  those  who 
manage  the  land,  experience  a  direct  connection  between 
effort  and  benefit ;  while,  were  it  under  state-ownership, 
those  who  managed  it  would  experience  no  such  direct 
connection.  The  vices  of  officialism  would  inevitably 
entail  immense  evils. 


"justice" — "  TUE    LAND   QUESTION."  293 

Was  ever  philosopher  so  perplexed  before  ? 

Mr.  Spencer  started  out  in  1850  to  tell  us  what 
are  our  rights  to  land.  And,  excepting  that  he  fell 
into  some  confusion  by  carelessly  transforming  equal 
rights  into  joint  rights,  he  clearly  did  so.  But  now, 
in  1892,  and  in  the  climax  of  the  Spencerian  Syn- 
thetic Philosophy,  he  has  got  himself  into  a  maze,  in 
which  the  living  and  the  dead  —  Normans,  Danes, 
Norsemen,  Frisians,  Celts,  Saxons,  Welsh,  and  High- 
landers; old  English  and  new  English;  plebeians, 
with  aristocratic  names,  and  aristocrats  with  plebeian 
names,  and  female  .descendants  who  have  changed 
their  names  ;  ancient  filibusters  and  modern  filibus- 
ters —  are  all  so  whirling  round  that,  in  sheer  despair, 
he  springs  for  guidance  to  "a  land-owner  who  is  at,  the 
same  time  a  Queen's  counsel,"  and  is  led  by  him  plump 
into  the  English  poor  law  and  a  long  array  of  figures. 

Yet,  in  the  mad  whirl  he  still  pretends  to  consist>- 
ency.  "  I  adhere,"  he  says,  "  to  the  inference  origi- 
nally drawn,  that  the  aggregate  of  men  forming  the 
community  are  the  supreme  owners  of  the  land." 

Here  is  that  inference  in  his  own  words  —  the  in- 
ference originally  drawn  in  "  Social  Statics  :  " 

Given  a  race  of  beings  having  like  claims  to  pursue 
the  objects  of  their  desires,  given  a  world  adapted  to 
the  gratification  of  those  desires  —  a  world  into  which 
such  beings  are  similarly  born,  and  it  unavoidably  fol- 
lows that  they  have  equal  rights  to  the  use  of  this  world. 
.  .  .  Equity  therefore  does  not  permit  private  property 
inland.  .  .  .  The  right  of  mankind  at  large  to  the  earth's 
surface  is  still  valid ;  all  deeds,  customs,  and  laws  not- 
withstanding. 

What  is  it  that  Mr.  Spencer  here  asserts  ?  Not 
that  men  derive  their  rifjhts  to  the  use  of  the  earth 


29-1  RECANTATION. 

by  gift,  bequest  or  inheritance,  from  their  ancestors, 
or  from  any  previous  men,  but  that  they  derive  them 
from  the  fact  of  their  own  existence.  Who  lived  on 
the  earth  before  them,  or  what  sucli  predecessors  did, 
has  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  the  matter.  The 
equal  right  to  the  use  of  land  belongs  to  each  man 
as  man.  It  begins  with  his  birth ;  it  continues  till 
his  death.  It  can  be  destroyed  or  superseded  by  no 
human  action  whatever. 

And  this  is  the  ground  on  which,  without  excep- 
tion, stand  all  who  demand  the  resumption  of  equal 
rights  to  land.  Where  there  has  been  any  reference 
on  their  part  to  the  wrongfulness  of  past  appropria- 
tions of  land,  it  has  merely  been  —  as  in  the  case  of 
Mr.  Spencer  himself  in  "Social  Statics" — by  way 
of  illustrating  the  origin  of  private  property  in  land, 
not  by  way  of  basing  the  demand  for  the  rights  of 
living  men  on  the  proof  of  wrongs  done  to  dead  men.^ 
Neither  Mr.  Spencer  in  his  "  straight  "  days,  nor  any 
one  else  who  has  stood  for  equal  rights  in  land,  ever 
di-eamed  of  such  a  stultifying  proposition  as  that  the 
right  to  the  use  of  land  must  be  drawn  from  some 

1  I,  for  instance,  have  uniformly  asserted  that  it  made  no  differ- 
ence whatever  whether  land  has  been  made  private  property  by 
force  or  by  consent;  that  the  equal  right  to  its  use  is  a  natural  and 
inalienable  right  of  the  living,  and  that  this  is  the  ground,  and  the 
only  ground,  on  which  the  resumption  of  those  rights  should  be 
demanded.     Thus  in  "The  Irish  Land  Question,"  in  1881,  I  said: 

The  indictment  which  really  lies  against  the  Irish  landlords  is 
not  that  tlieir  ancestors  or  the  ancestors  of  their  grantors  robbed 
the  ancestors  of  the  Irish  people.  That  makes  no  difference. 
"  I^et  the  dead  bury  their  dead."  The  indictment  that  truly  lies 
is,  that  here  and  now,  they  rob  the  Irish  people.  .  .  .  The  great- 
est enemy  of  the  people's  cause  is  he  who  appeals  to  national 
passions  and  excites  old  hatreds.  He  is  its  best  friend  who  does 
his  utmost  to  bury  them  out  of  sight. 


"justice" — "THE   LAND   QUESTION.''  295 

dispossessed  generation,  for  this  would  be  to  assert 
what  he  so  ridiculed,  that  "God  has  given  one  charter 
of  privilege  to  one  generation  and  another  to  the 
next." 

Yet,  now,  this  same  Herbert  Spencer  actually  as- 
sumes that  the  only  question  of  moral  right  as  to 
land  is,  who  robbed  whom,  in  days  whereof  the  very 
memory  has  perished,  and  when,  according  to  him, 
everybody  was  engaged  in  robbing  everybody  else. 
He  not  only  eats  his  own  words,  denies  his  own  per- 
ceptions, and  endeavors  to  confuse  the  truth  he  once 
bore  witness  to,  but  he  assumes  that  the  whole  great 
movement  for  the  recognition  of  equal  rights  to  land, 
that  is  beginning  to  show  its  force  wherever  the 
English  tongue  is  spoken,  has  for  its  object  only  recti- 
fication of  past  injustices  —  the  ridiculous  search,  in 
which  he  pretends  to  engage,  as  to  what  ancestor 
robbed  what  ancestor  —  and  that  until  that  is  discov- 
ered, those  who  now  hold  as  their  private  property  the 
inalienable  heritage  of  all  may  hold  it  still.  And  in 
the  course  of  tliis  "  argument,"  this  advocate  of  the 
rich  against  the  poor,  of  the  strong  against  the  weak, 
declares  that  the  toiling  masses  of  England,  made 
ignorant  and  brutal  and  powerless  by  their  dis- 
inheritance, have  lost  their  natural  rights  by  serving 
as  food  for  powder  and  payers  of  taxes  in  foreign 
wars  waged  by  the  ruling  classes. 

This  is  bad  enough ;  but  more  follows.  Mr.  Spencer 
discovers  a  new  meaning  in  the  English  poor  laws. 

In  "  Social  Statics,"  be  it  remembered,  he  declared 
that  the  equal  right  to  the  use  of  land  is  the 
natural,  direct,  inalienable  right  of  all  men,  having 
its   derivation   in    the   fact   of   their  existence,  and 


296  RECANTATION. 

of  which  they  can  in  no  possible  way  be  equi- 
tably deprived.  He  declared  that  equity  does  not 
permit  private  property  in  land,  and  that  it  is 
impossible  to  discover  any  mode  by  which  land  can 
become  private  property.  He  scouted  the  idea 
that  force  can  give  right,  or  that  sale  or  bequest  or 
prescription  can  make  invalid  claims  valid';  saying 
that,  "  though  nothing  be  multiplied  forever,  it  will 
not  jDroduce  one  " ;  asking,  "  How  long  does  it  take  for 
what  was  originally  wrong  to  grow  into  a  right?  and 
at  what  rate  per  annum  do  invalid  claims  become 
valid?"  He  declared  that  neither  use  nor  im- 
provement, nor  even  the  free  consent  of  all  existing 
men,  could  give  private  ownership  in  land,  or  bar  the 
equal  right  of  the  next  child  born.  And  he,  more- 
over, proved  that  land  nationalization,  which  he  then 
proposed  as  the  only  equitable  treatment  of  land,  did 
not  involve  state  administration. 

Not  one  of  the  arguments  of  "  Social  Statics  "  is 
answered  in  "  Justice  "  —  not  even  the  showino-  that 
land  nationalization  merely  involves  a  change  in  the 
receivers  of  rent,  and  not  the  governmental  occupa- 
tion and  use  of  land.  There  are  two  things,  and  two 
things  only,  that  Mr.  Spencer  admits  that  he  over- 
looked —  the  relation  of  the  poor  law  to  the  claims  of 
land-owners,  and  the  amount  of  compensation  which 
the  landless  must  give  to  the  landed  "for  all  that 
value  which  the  labor  of  ages  has  given  to  the  land." 

Mr.  Spencer  has  discussed  the  poor  law  before. 
One  of  the  longest  of  the  chapters  of  "Social 
Statics,"  from  which  I  have  already  quoted,^  is  de- 
voted  to   it;    and   in  recent  writings  he  has    again 

1  pp.  89-90. 


"  JUSTICE  " —  "  THE  LAND   QUESTION."  297 

referred  to  it.  In  "  Social  Statics  "  he  declares  that 
the  excuse  made  for  a  poor  law  —  that  it  is  a  com- 
pensation to  the  disinherited  for  the  deprivation 
of  their  birthright  —  has  much  plausibility;  but  he 
objects,  not  only  that  the  true  remedy  is  to  restore 
equal  rights  to  land,  but  that  the  poor  law  does  not 
give  compensation,  insisting  that  poor  rates  are  in 
the  main  paid  by  non-landowners,  and  that  it  is  only 
here  and  there  that  one  of  those  kept  out  of  their 
inheritance  gets  any  part  of  them. 

In  1884,  in  "  The  Coming  Slavery,"  he  repeats  the 
assertion  that  non-landowners  get  no  benefit  from 
the  poor  law,  saying  — 

The  amount  wliich  under  the  old  poor  law  the  half- 
pauperized  laborer  received  from  the  parish  to  eke  out 
his  weekly  income  was  not  really,  as  it  appeared,  a 
bonus,  for  it  was  accompanied  by  a  substantially  equiv- 
alent decrease  of  his  wages,  as  was  quickly  proved  when 
the  system  was  abolished  and  the  wages  rose. 

In  "  The  Sins  of  Legislators,"  he  repeats  that 
instead  of  being  paid  by  land-owners,  the  poor  rates 
really  fall  on  non-land  owners,  saying  — 

As,  under  the  old  poor  law,  the  diligent  and  provi- 
dent laborer  had  to  pay  that  the  good-for-nothings  might 
not  suffer,  until  frequently,  under  this  extra  burden,  he 
broke  down  and  himself  took  refuge  in  the  workhouse 
—  as,  at  present,  it  is  admitted  that  the  total  rates  levied 
in  large  towns  for  all  public  purposes,  have  now  reached 
such  a  height  that  they  ''cannot  be  exceeded  without 
inflicting  great  hardship  on  the  small  shopkeepers  and 
artisans,  who  already  find  it  difficult  enough  to  keep 
themselves  free  from  pauper  taint." 

But  in  Appendix  B  Mr,  Spencer  ignores  all  this. 
He    assumes   that   land-ownei'S  have   been   the   real 


298  EECANTATION. 

payers  and  the  disinherited  the  real  receivers  of  the 
poor  rates;  and,  adding  together  all  that  the  land- 
owners have  paid  in  poor  rates  since  the  time  of 
Queen  Elizabeth,  he  puts  the  whole  sum  to  their 
credit  in  a  ledger  account  between  existing  landlords 
and  existing  landless. 

He  begins  this  account  at  1601.  He  credits  the 
landlords  and  charges  the  landless  with  all  that  has 
been  collected  from  land  for  poor  rates  between  1601 
and  1890.  Now,  if  this  is  done,  what  is  to  be  put  on 
the  otlier  side  of  the  ledger?  We  must  take  the 
same  date,  the  ordinary  book-keeper  would  say,  and 
charge  tlie  landlords  and  credit  the  landless  with  all 
the  ground  rents  the  land-owners  have  received  from 
1601  to  1890.  To  this  we  must  add  all  that  the 
land-owners  have  received  from  the  produce  of  gen- 
eral taxes  between  1601  and  1890,  by  virtue  of  their 
political  power  as  landlords. ^  And  to  this  we  must 
again  add  the  selling  value  in  1890  of  the  land  of 
England,  exclusive  of  improvements.  The  difference 
will  show  what,  if  we  are  to  go  back  to  1601,  and  no 
farther,  existincr  landlords  now  owe  to  existinix  land- 
less. 

This  would  be  the  way  of  ordinary,  every-day 
book-keeping  if  it  were  undertaken  to  make  up  such  a 
debtor  and  creditor  account  from  1601  to  1890.  But 
this  is  not  the  way  of  SjDencerian  synthetic  book- 
keeping.    What  Mr.   Spencer  does,  after  crediting 


1  The  Financial  Beform  Almanac  has  given  some  idea  of  what 
enormous  sums  the  British  land-owners  have  received  from  the 
offices,  pensions  and  sinecures  they  have  secured  for  themselves, 
and  from  their  habit  of  providing  for  younger  sons  and  poorer 
relatives  in  the  army,  navy,  church,  and  civil  administration. 


"justice" — "THE   LAND   QUESTION."         299 

landlords  and  charging  the  landless  with  the  amount 
collected  from  land  for  poor  rates  between  1601  and 
1890,  is,  omitting  all  reference  to  mesne  profits,  to 
credit  the  landless  and  charge  the  landlords  witli 
the  valne  of  the  land  of  England,  not  as  it  is,  bnt 
"  in  its  primitive,  unsubdued  state,  furnishing  nothing 
but  wild  animals  and  wild  fruits  "  —  that  is,  before 
there  were  any  men.  This  —  though  by  what  sort 
of  synthetic  calculus  he  gets  at  it  he  does  not  tell 
us  —  Mr.  Spencer  estimates  at  X  500,000,000,  a  sum 
that  will  about  square  the  account,  with  some  little 
balance  on  the  side  of  the  landlords  ! 

Generous  to  the  poor  landless  is  Mr.  Accountant 
Spencer !  —  so  generous  that  he  ought  to  make  a 
note  of  it  in  writing  Part  VI.  of  his  "  Principles  of 
Ethics  "  —  "  The  Ethics  of  Social  Life  :  Positive 
Beneficence."  For  is  it  not  positive  beneficence  to 
those  who  are  to  be  credited  with  it  to  say  that 
£500,000,000  would  be  a  high  estimate  of  the  value 
of  England  when  there  was  nothing  there  but  wild 
animals  and  wild  fruit?  To  one  of  less  wide  matr- 
nificence  two  and  threepence  would  seem  to  be  rather 
more  than  a  high  estimate  of  the  value  of  the  land 
of  England  before  man  came. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

PRINCIPAL   BPvOWK. 

Really,  this  final  close  of  the  most  important  dis- 
cussion of  the  most  important  book  of  the  most 
important  grand  division  of  the  great  Spencerian 
Synthetic  Philosophy  can  only  be  fitly  treated  by 
calling  on  the  imagination  for  an  illustration : 

Mr.  J.  D.  Brown,  for  some  time  before  our  civil 
war  a  prominent  citizen  of  Vicksburg,  Mississippi, 
was  a  native  of  Connecticut,  of  Puritan  stock  and 
thrifty  habits.  Beginning  life  as  a  clock-maker, 
he  emigrated  when  a  young  man  to  that  part  of 
Ohio,  settled  from  New  England,  which  is  still  in 
those  regions  known  as  the  Western  Reserve.  There 
he  went  to  school-teaching,  joined  a  local  literary 
society,  and  made  some  speeches  which  were  highly 
applauded,  and  in  v/hich  he  did  not  hesitate  to  de- 
nounce slavery  as  the  su!n  of  all  villanies,  and  to 
declare  for  immediate,  unconditional  emancipation. 
Somewhat  later  on,  he  went  South  and  settled  at 
Vicksburg,  where  he  became  professor  of  moral  philos- 
ophy in  a  young  ladies'  seminary,  and,  finally,  its 
principal.  Being  prudent  in  speaking  of  the  peculiar 
institution,  and  gaining  a  reputation  for  profundity, 
he  became  popular  in  the  best  society,  a  favorite 
guest  in  the  lavish  hospitalities  of  the  wealthier 
planters,  and,  in  the  Southern  manner,  was  always 


PRiNCirAL  r.iiowN,  301 

spoken  of  to  visitors  witli  pride  as  "Principal  Brown, 
one  of  our  most  distinguished  men,  sir !  —  a  great 
educator,  and  a  great  authority  on  moral  philoso- 
phy, sir ! " 

The  slavery  question  was  in  the  mean  time  grow- 
ing hotter  and  hotter.  There  were  no  abolitionists 
in  Vicksburg  or  in  the  country  about,  for  any  one 
suspected  of  abolitionism  was  promptly  lynched,  or 
sent  North  in  a  coat  of  tar  and  feathers.  But  slaves 
were  occasionally  disappearing,  among  them  some  of 
especial  value  as  meclianics;  and  even  a  very  valuable 
yellow  girl,  whose  beauty  and  accomplishments  were 
such  that  her  owner  had  refused  85,000  for  her,  had 
been  spirited  off  by  the  underground  railroad.  And 
"  society  "  in  Vicksburg  was  becoming  more  and  more 
excited.  Though  no  one  yet  dreamed  that  it  was 
destined  ere  long  to  redden  the  Mississippi,  and 
light  the  skies  of  Vicksburg  with  bursting  bombs,  the 
cloud  on  the  northern  horizon  was  visibly  swelling 
and  darkening,  and  in  "  bleeding  Kansas  "  a  guerrilla 
war  had  already  crimsoned  the  grass. 

Still,  the  lines  of  Principal  Brown  were  cast  in 
pleasant  places,  and  he  received  the  honors  due  to  a 
great  philosopher,  deemed  all  the  greater  by  those 
who  in  their  secret  hearts  did  not  find  his  moral 
philosophy  quite  intelligible  ;  for  he  not  only  made  a 
practice  of  using  the  longest  words  and  of  interlard- 
ing his  discourses  with  references  to  people  of  whom 
his  auditors  had  never  heard,  and  of  whom  he  could 
say  anything  he  pleased,  but  he  had  taken  Balzac's 
hint,  and  every  now  and  again  he  strung  together  a 
series  of  words  that  sounded  as  though  they  might 
mean  something,  but  really  had  no  meaning  at  aU. 


802  EECANTATION. 

He  had  thus  gahiecl  a  reputation  for  great  profundity 
with  those  who  vainly  puzzled  over  tliem,  and  who 
attributed  their  difficulty  to  an  ignorance  they  were 
ashamed  to  admit. 

But  one  woful  day  there  came  to  Vieksburg  some 
echo  of  one  of  his  debating-club  speeches  in  the 
Western  Reserve,  and  some  of  the  leading  citizens 
deemed  fit  to  interrogate  him.  He  had  to  lie  a.  little, 
but  succeeded  in  quieting  them ;  and  as  not  much 
was  said  about  the  matter,  his  standing  in  Vieksburg 
society  was,  in  general,  unchanged. 

Following  this,  however,  something  worse  hap- 
pened. The  Rev.  Dr.  Sorely,  one  of  the  most  elo- 
quent divines  of  the  Methodist  Church  South,  made 
a  trip  to  Ohio,  and  in  the  Western  Reserve  delivered 
a  lecture  on  the  biblical  and  patriarchal  system  of 
labor  as  practised  by  our  Southern  brethren.  Among 
the  auditors  was  a  man  who  remembered  and  quoted 
some  of  the  eloquent  utterances,  on  the  other  side,  of 
the  reverend  doctor's  friend,  Principal  Brown.  The 
matter  might  have  passed  unheeded,  but  that  the 
Vieksburg  Thunderbolt^  anticipating  much  glory  to 
the  South  from  the  Northern  visit  of  its  eloquent 
defender,  had  sent  a  special  correspondent  with  him ; 
and  a  report  of  the  lecture,  including  the  reference 
to  Principal  Brown,  duly  appeared  in  its  columns. 

This  was  indeed  a  serious  matter,  and  the  Princi- 
pal wrote  immediately  to  the  Thunderbolt  with  feel- 
ing and  vehemence.  He  said  tluit  he  feared  that 
if  he  remained  silent  many  would  think  he  had 
said  things  he  had  not  said  ;  intimated  that  he  had 
never  been  in  Ohio,  and  what  he  had  said  when  he 
was  there  he  had  said  for  the  purpose  of  finding  a 


PRINCIPAL    P.IIOWN.  803 

secure  basis  for  slavery  ;  that  lie  had  only  been  talk- 
ing of  transcendental  ethics,  and  not  of  sublunary 
ethics  at  all;  that  he  had  always  insisted  that  the 
slave-owners  of  the  South  should  be  paid  in  full  for 
their  slaves;  that  he  had  never  supposed  that  the 
question  would  come  up  for  millions  of  years  yet ; 
and  that  the  most  he  had  said  was  that,  "  It  may  be 
doubted,  if  it  does  not  possibly  seem  inferable,  that 
perhaps  there  may  be  reason  to  suspect  that  at  some 
future  time  the  slaves  may  be  liberated,  after  paying 
to  their  owners  more  than  they  are  worth ;  but  I 
have  no  positive  opinion  as  to  what  may  hereafter 
take  place,  and  am  only  sure  that,  if  emancipation 
ever  does  take  place,  the  negroes  must  pay  to  their 
owners  far  more  in  interest  on  their  purchase  money 
than  they  now  pay  in  work." 

To  most  of  the  citizens  of  Vicksbursr  this  seemed 
entirely  satisfactory,  but  there  were  some  dissen- 
tients. Colonel  F.  E.  Green  strongly  urged  patriotic 
citizens  not  to  think  of  such  a  thingf  as  treatingf  the 
Principal  to  a  coat  of  tar  and  feathers,  and  Professor 
Bullhead,  of  the  leading  young  men's  seminary, 
wrote  to  the  Thunderbolt,  requesting  his  respected 
colleague  to  give  a  categorical  answer  to  the  ques- 
tion "  whether,  when  A  B  went  to  the  slave  pen  and 
bought  a  negro,  the  negro  Avas  or  was  not  his  prop- 
erty, morally  as  well  as  legally."  If  yes,  then  Pro- 
fessor Bullhead  wanted  to  know  what  his  learned  and 
respected  friend  meant  by  admitting  the  possibility 
of  emancipation  even  some  millions  of  years  hence  ; 
and  if  no,  then  Professor  Bullhead  wanted  Principal 
Brown  to  tell  him  why  the  slaves,  before  regaining 
their  freedom,  must  pay  their  owners  more  than  they 


304  BECANTATION. 

were  worth.  And  Professor  Bullhead  closed  with 
some  sarcastic  references  to  transcendental  ethics. 

Principal  Brown  did  not  answer  this  plain  ques- 
tion of  his  friend  Professor  Bullhead,  but  got  rid  of 
him  as  quickly  as  he  could,  telling  him  that  there 
was  no  dispute  between  them,  since  they  both  insisted 
on  the  right  of  any  citizen  to  work  and  whip  his  own 
negro,  and  then  luring  him  off  into  a  long  discus- 
sion of  transcendental  ethics  vs.  sublunary  ethics. 
But  it  was  evident  that  something  more  had  to  be 
done,  and  the  papers  soon  contained  an  announce- 
ment that  Principal  Brown  proposed  to  iorego  for  a 
time  the  publication  of  Volumes  XXIV.  and  XXV. 
of  his  great  work  on  Moral  Philosophy,  and  imme- 
diately to  bring  out  Volume  XXVI.,  containing 
a  chapter  on  the  slavery  question,  which  he  proposed 
to  read  to  the  citizens  of  Vicksburg  at  a  public 
meeting. 

The  lecture  drew  a  large  audience  of  the  first  citi- 
zens of  Vicksburg.  There  was  also  a  sprinkling  of 
rougher  citizens,  some  of  wliom  before  entering  the 
hall  deposited  in  a  rear  lot  a  long  rail  tliat  they  had 
brought  with  them,  and  some  pails  that  smelled  like 
tar,  with  a  number  of  large  but  evidently  light  sacks. 
However,  the  lecture  was  a  great  success,  and  at  the 
close.  Principal  Brown's  hand  was  nearly  shaken  off, 
and  he  was  escorted  to  his  home  by  an  enthusiastic 
and  cheering  croAvd,  who  vowed  that  nothing  like 
such  a  "demolisher  to  the  nigger-lovers"  had  ever 
been  heard  in  Vicksburg  before. 

But  although  the  stately  periods  of  the  Principal 
are  occasionally  marred  by  what  is  evidently  a  repor- 
torial  tendency  to  the  slang  of  the  time,  let  me  quote 


PRINCIPAL   BROWN.  305 

from  the  papers  of  the  next  day,  which  contained 
long  reports  of  the  speech,  accompanied  with  glow- 
ing encomiums :  — 

[From  the  Vicksburg  Thunderbolt,  June  19,  1859.] 

The  wealth  and  beauty  and  fashion  of  Vicksburg 
turned  out  in  full  force  last  evening  to  listen  to  a  lec- 
ture on  the  slavery  question  by  our  distinguished 
townsman,  Principal  J.  D.  Brown,  the  widely  hon- 
ored writer  on  moral  philosophy.  In  the  audience 
our  reporter  counted  thirty-seven  colonels,  two  majors, 
and  thirty-two  judges,  besides  the  pastors  of  all  the 
leading  churches.  It  is  a  great  pity,  as  many  of  the 
enthusiastic  hearei's  said,  while  congratulating  Prin- 
cipal Brown  and  each  other  at  the  conclusion,  that 
William  Lloyd  Garrison  and  Wendell  Phillips  them- 
selves could  not  have  been  there ;  for  if  their  miser- 
able nigger-loving  hides  could  be  penetrated  by  the 
solid  blocks  of  learning,  the  unanswerable  logic,  and 
the  mathematical  demonstrations  which  Principal 
Brown  poured  into  his  audience,  they  would  have 
sung  exceedingly  small ;  even  if  they  had  not  seen 
the  full  wickedness  of  their  efforts  to  rob  the  widow 
and  the  orphan  by  interfering  mth  our  beneficent 
domestic  institution. 

Much  of  Princijjal  Brown's  lecture  it  will  be  impos- 
sible to  give  to  our  readers  this  morning,  for  our  re- 
porter, not  being  well  versed  in  Moral  Philosophy, 
finds  himself  unable  from  his  notes  to  make  sense  of 
some  of  the  more  profound  passages,  and  is  uncertain 
as  to  how  some  of  the  authorities  cited  spell  their 
names.  There  was  some  confusion,  too,  in  the  hall 
when  Principal  Brown  touched  on  the  subject  of 
transcendental  ethics,  and  said  that  he  had  always 
held,  and  always  would  hold,  that,  in  transcendental 
ethics  all  men  were  pretty  much  alike.  But  Colonel 
Johnson  rose  in  his  place  and  stilled  the  disturbance, 
asking  the  audience  to  keep  their  coats  on  till  the 


306  BECANTATION. 

PrincijDal  got  through ;  and  when  Principal  Brown 
explained  that  transcendental  ethics  related  to  the 
other  side  of  the  moon,  while  sublunary  ethics  related 
to  this  side  of  the  moon,  there  was  silence  again.  It 
was  in  the  wind-up,  however,  tliat  the  professor  got 
in  liis  best  work,  and  roused  his  audience  to  the  high- 
est pitch  of  delight  and  enthusiasm.     He  said:  — 

There  are  people  who  contend  that  these  negro  slaves 
of  the  South,  after  they  have  paid  their  owners  in 
full  the  compensation  due  them,  ought  to  be  put  back 
in  their  native  land.  But  how  are  we  to  find  who 
brought  them  here  ?  Some  were  brought  in  Spanish 
vessels,  some  in  Portuguese  vessels,  some  in  Dutch, 
some  in  Eughsh,  and  some  in  American  vessels ;  and 
these  vessels  are  all  by  this  time  sunk  or  destroyed,  and 
their  owners  and  crews  are  dead,  and  their  descendants 
have  got  mixed.  Besides,  they  only  got  the  uegroes 
from  the  barracoons  on  the  African  coast.  Who  is  to  tell 
where  the  ancestor  of  each  one  was  taken  from  and  who 
took  him  to  the  coast  ?  Many  of  these  slaves  bear  such 
names  as  Brown,  Smith,  Jones,  and  Simpson,  names 
borne  by  the  very  men  who  brought  their  progenitors 
here.  Then  they  have  such  given  names  as  Caesar,  Han- 
nibal, Dick,  Tom,  Harry,  Ephraim,  Alexander,  and 
Nebuchadnezzar,  so  that  ;io  one  can  tell  from  their 
names  whether  they  originally  came  from  Africa  or 
England,  Italy,  Jerusalem,  Greece,  or  Assyria.  And 
what  have  these  negroes  ever  done  for  freedom  ?  Did  any 
one  ever  hear  of  them  expressing  any  sympathy  for  the 
independence  of  Greece,  or  protesting  against  the  Rus- 
sian invasion  of  Hungary,  or  even  contributing  for  the 
conversion  of  the  Jews,  or  for  sending  missionaries  to 
the  South  Sea  Islands,  where  only  man  is  vile  ?  Con- 
trariwise, when  British  tyranny  invaded  our  shores  did 
not  these  negroes  work  just  as  readily  for  the  hirelings 
of  King  George  as  they  did  for  their  own  patriotic  mas- 
ters who  were  fighting  the  battles  of  liberty  ?  And 
to-day  when  a  nigger  runs  away,  where  does  he  head 
for  ?  Does  he  not  make  a  straight  streak  for  Canada, 
a  country  groaning  under  the  government  of  an  effete 
monarchj^,  and  with  a  full-fledged  aristocrat  for  governor- 


PKINCIPAL  BROWN.  307 

general  ?  One  would  like  to  know  that  these  negro 
slaves,  whom  it  is  proposed  to  send  back  to  their  native 
land  when  they  have  compensated  their  owners,  have 
some  real  love  for  free  institutions,  before  thrusting 
freedom  upon  them.  . 

To  think  that  slavery  was  wrongly  established  is 
natural,  and  not  without  warrant  in  transcendental 
ethics.  But  if  we  entertain  the  thought  of  rectification, 
there  arises  in  the  first  place  the  question  —  who  enslaved 
them  ?  Their  owners  did  not.  They  only  bought  them. 
These  negroes  were  enslaved  by  negroes  like  themselves, 
—  likely  enough  by  their  own  mothers,  cousins,  and  aunts. 
Now  which  are  the  descendants  of  the  one  and  which  of 
the  other  ?  and  where  are  they  to  be  found  ?  But  sup- 
posing that  they  could  be  found,  there  would  still  have 
to  be  recognized  a  transaction  which  goes  far  to  prevent 
rectification.  If  we  are  to  go  back  upon  the  past  at  all, 
we  must  go  back  upon  the  past  wholly,  and  take  account 
of  what  it  has  cost  to  feed  and  clothe  and  keep  these 
negroes  since  they  have  been  here. 

I  have  consulted  one  of  our  most  eminent  negro 
traders,  a  gentleman  who  has  probably  bought  and  sold 
more  negroes  than  any  one  in  the  Southwest,  and  after  a 
close  calculation,  he  informs  me  that  taking  men,  women, 
and  children  together,  and  considering  the  loss  of  their 
labor  which  their  owners  have  to  suffer  in  the  rearing  of 
children,  sickness,  and  old  age,  and  the  cost  of  overseers, 
drivers,  patrols,  and  an  occasional  pack  of  bloodhounds, 
the  average  negro  costs  the  average  owner  a  fraction  over 
$267.57  per  annum.  But  as  I  wish  to  be  generous  to 
the  negro  I  have  thrown  off  the  57  cents  and  a  fraction, 
and  will  put  their  cost  to  their  masters  at  only  $267  a 
year. 

Now,  the  first  cargo  of  negro  slaves  was  landed  in 
Jamestown,  Virginia,  in  the  year  1620,  and  the  external 
slave  trade  was  abolished  in  1808.  We  may  therefore  as- 
sume the  average  time  during  which  each  negro  has  been 
in  this  country  as  one  hundred  and  fifty  years.  Saying 
nothing  whatever  about  interest,  it  is  thus  clear  that 
each  living  negro  owes  to  his  owner,  as  the  cost  of  keep- 
ing him,  $267  a  year  for  one  hundred  and  fifty  years, 
which,  excluding  interest,  amounts  at  the  present  time  to 
just  $40,050.     (Great  applause.) 


308  RECANTATION. 

Here  a  man  in  a  back  seat  rose,  and  in  a  decidedly 
Yankee  accent  asked  Principal  Brown  if  he  included 
negro  babies  ?  The  Principal  replying  in  the  affirma- 
tive, the  intruder  began:  ''How  can  a  negro  baby 
just  born  owe  any  one  forty  thou  "  —  The  rest  of  the 
sentence  was  lo,st  by  the  sudden  exit  of  the  intruder 
from  the  hall,  over  the  heads  of  the  audience.  There 
was  quite  an  excitement  for  a  few  moments,  but 
Colonel  Johnson  again  rose  and  restored  order  by 
asking  the  young  men  in  the  rear  not  to  escort  the 
interrupter  further  than  the  vacant  lot  adjoining  until 
the  close  of  the  proceedings,  as  the  audience  were 
intent  on  enjoying  the  remainder  of  the  logical  feast 
which  their  distinguished  townsman  was  laying  be- 
fore them.  All  being  quiet  again,  Principal  Brown 
resumed : 

Observe  that  the  negroes  have  not  an  equitable 
claim  to  themselves  in  their  present  condition  — washed, 
clothed  and  fed,  civilized,  Christianized  and  taught  how 
to  work  —  but  only  to  themselves  in  their  primitive  wild 
and  uncivilized  condition.  Now,  what  is  the  relation  be- 
tween the  original  "  wild  nigger  "  value  of  each  slave 
aiid  what  each  one  of  them  has  received  from  his  owner 
during  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  ?  We  know  that 
they  were  bought  at  the  barracoons,  delivered  on  board 
ship  at  prices  ranging  from  a  half-pound  of  beads  to  a 
bottle  of  rum  or  a  Manchester  musket,  the  owners  being 
at  the  cost  of  transporting  them  to  America,  including 
the  heavy  insurance  caused  by  the  necessarily  great 
mortality,  items  wliich  as  you  will  observe  I  have  not 
charged  against  the  existing  slaves.  My  friend  the  slave 
merchant  estimates  that  on  an  average  15s.  9d.  English 
money  would  be  a  high  rate.  Let  us  call  it,  however,  $4 
American  money.  Thus  we  see  that  an  equitable  rectifi- 
cation would  require  that  each  negro  in  the  South  should 
pay  his  owner  a  balance  of  $40,046  !  (Loud  and  long- 
continued  applause.) 

Now,  when  in  the  Western  Reserve  many  years  ago, 
I  drew  from  transcendental  ethics  the  corollary  that  the 
ownership  of  a  man  could  not  be  equitably  alienated 


PRLNCirAI.    P.UOWN.  309 

from  the  man  himself,  and  argued  that  after  the  slaves 
had  compensated  their  owners  they  should  be  freed,  I  had 
overlooked  the  foregoing  considerations.  Moreover,  I 
did  not  clearly  see  what  would  be  implied  by  the  giving 
of  compensation  for  all  that  during  these  one  hundred 
and  fifty  years  it  has  cost  the  owner  to  keep  the  slave. 
While,  therefore,  I  adhere  to  the  inference  originally 
drawn  —  that  is  to  say,  as  far  as  transcendental  ethics 
is  concerned  —  a  fuller  consideration  of  the  matter  has 
led  me  to  the  conclusion  that  slavery,  subject  to  the 
right  of  the  slave  to  buy  himself  on  payment  to  his 
owner  of  what  he  has  cost,  say  $40,046,  should  be  main- 
tained. But  it  may  be  readily  seen  that  such  a  transac- 
tion would  be  a  losing  one  to  the  slaves  themselves,  for  at 
the  present  market  price  of  negroes,  they  are  not  worth, 
big  and  little,  more  than  $1,000  each.  And,  whereas 
I  have  also  said  that  I  really  did  not  know  but  that  in 
the  course  of  some  millions  of  years  it  might  possibly 
be  that  the  slaves  could  be  allowed  their  freedom  on 
paying  to  their  owners  full  compensation,  I  now  see, 
since  what  is  due  from  them  to  their  masters  is  con- 
stantly increasing,  that  with  humanity  as  it  now  is,  the 
implied  reorganization  would  become  more  and  more 
unprofitable.  (Still  louder  and  longer  applause,  led  by 
Professor  Bullhead,  who  called  for  three  times  three 
cheers,  which  were  given  with  a  will,  the  audience  rising 
and  the  ladies  waving  their  handkerchiefs.) 

I  also  wish  to  point  out  that  all  this  talk  about  giving 
their  freedom  to  the  slaves  is  as  foolish  as  it  is  wicked. 
Since  under  our  laws  the  slave  himself  is  the  property 
of  the  master,  the  slaves  already  have  their  freedom 
in  the  freedom  of  the  master.  Thus  the  equal  freedom 
of  each  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided  that  he  in- 
terferes not  with  the  equal  freedom  of  all  others,  as 
taught  by  transcendental  ethics,  is  already  recognized 
by  the  laws  of  the  South,  and  nothing  more  remains 
for  us  to  do,  except  to  keep  abolitionist  theories  from 
spreading  in  this  "land  of  the  free  and  home  of  the 
brave ! " 

The  uproarious  enthusiasm  of  the  audience  could 
no  longer  be  restrained,  and,  led  by  Professor  Bull- 
head, who  rushed  on  the  stage  and  embraced  Princi- 


310  RECANTATION. 

pal  Brown,  our  best  citizens  crowded  round  him. 
During  this  time  the  wretch  who  had  interrupted  the 
Principal  was  tarred  and  feathered  in  an  adjoining 
lot,  and  ridden  on  a  rail  to  the  levee.  Unfortunately 
all  efforts  of  the  police  to  discover  the  perpetrators 
of  this  reprehensible  proceeding  have  failed.  It  is 
generally  supposed  to  have  been  the  work  of  some 
negroes  who  were  listening  through  the  open  windows 
and  whose  feelings  were  hurt  by  the  slighting  insin- 
uation of  the  stranger  as  to  the  value  of  colored 
infants. 

While  thus  calling  attention  to  the  similarity  be- 
tween Mr.  Spencer's  philosophic  methods  and  those 
of  Principal  Brown,  I  do  not  wish  to  make  any 
personal  comparison  between  the  two  philosophers. 
Since  he  was  under  fear  of  tar  and  feathers,  that 
would  be  unjust  to  Principal  Brown. 


CONCLUSION. 


THE  MORAL  OF  THIS   EXAMINATION. 


I  had  rather  believe  all  the  fables  in  the  legend,  and  the  Talmud,  and  the 
Alcoran,  than  tluit  tliis  universal  frame  is  witliout  a  mind.  .  .  .  It  is  true 
that  a  little  philosophy  inclinetli  nian's  mind  to  atheism,  but  depth  in  pliiloso- 
phy  bringeth  men's  minds  about  to  religion;  for  while  tlie  mind  of  man 
looketli  upon  second  causes  scattered  it  may  sometimes  rest  iu  tliem  and  go 
no  further;  but  when  it  beholdeth  the  chain  of  them  confederate  and  linked 
together,  it  must  needs  fly  to  rrovideuce  and  Deity.  — Bacon. 


CONCLUSION. 

THE  MORAL   OF   THIS   EXAMINATION. 

I  HAVE  laid  before  the  reader  enough  to  show 
what  weight  is  due  to  Mr.  Spencer's  recantation  of 
his  earlier  declarations  on  the  land  question. 

But  even  his  high  reputation  and  great  influence 
would  not  have  led  me  to  make  so  elaborate  an  exami- 
nation, did  it  relate  only  to  him.  My  ^^urpose  has 
been  more  than  this. 

In  abandoning  his  earlier  opinions  Mr.  Spencer  has 
adopted  tliose  which  have  the  stamp  of  the  recognized 
authorities  of  our  time.  In  seeking  for  excuses  to 
justify  his  change  he  has  taken  the  best  he  could 
find ;  and  the  confusions  and  fallacies  and  subter- 
fuges to  which  he  resorts  are  such  as  pass  for  argu- 
ment with  the  many  men  of  reputation  and  ability, 
who  have  undertaken  to  defend  the  existing  system. 
Examination  will  show  that  no  better  defence  of  that 
system  has  been  made  or  can  be  made. 

Taking  Mr.  Spencer  as  the  foremost  representa- 
tive of  those  who  deny  the  justice  and  expediency  of 
recognizing  the  equal  right  to  land  —  a  pre-eminence 
given  him  by  his  great  reputation,  his  accorded  ability, 
and  the  fact  that  he  once  avowed  the  opinions  he  now 
seeks  to  discredit  —  I  have  set  forth  his  utterances 
on  the  land  question,  from  his  first  book  to  his  last, 
printing  them  in  full  in  oi-der  to  do  him  the  amplest 


314  COKCLUSION. 

justice,  and  subjecting  them  to  an  examination  which 
any  one  of  ordinary  ability  and  information  is  com- 
petent to  test.  I  have  thus  given  the  best  example 
to  be  found  in  the  writings  of  one  man,  of  what  may 
be  said  for  and  what  may  be  said  against  the  equal 
right  to  land. 

It  is  not  the  example  of  intellectual  prostitution 
thus  disclosed  that  I  would  dwell  upon.  It  is  the 
lesson  that  prompts  to  intellectual  self-reliance.  It 
is  not  merely  the  authority  of  Mr.  Spencer  as  a 
teacher  on  social  subjects  that  I  would  discredit ;  but 
the  blind  reliance  upon  authority.  For  on  such  sub- 
jects the  masses  of  men  cannot  safely  trust  authority. 
Given  a  wrong  which  affects  the  distribution  of 
wealth  and  differentiates  society  into  the  rich  and 
the  poor,  and  the  recognized  organs  of  opinion  and 
education,  since  they  are  dominated  by  the  wealthy 
class,  must  necessarily  represent  the  views  and  wishes 
of  those  who  profit  or  imagine  they  profit  by  the 
wrong. 

That  thought  on  social  questions  is  so  confused 
and  perplexed,  that  the  aspirations  of  great  bodies  of 
men,  deeply  though  vaguely  conscious  of  injustice, 
are  in  all  civilized  countries  being  diverted  to  futile 
and  dangerous  remedies,  is  largely  due  to  the  fact 
that  those  who  assume  and  are  credited  with  superior 
knowledge  of  social  and  economic  laws  have  devoted 
their  powers,  not  to  showing  where  the  injustice  lies 
but  to  hiding  it;  not  to  clearing  common  thought 
but  to  confusing  it. 

It  is  idle  to  quarrel  with  this  fact,  for  it  is  of  the 
nature  of  things,  and  is  shown  in  the  history  of  every 
great   movement    against    social   wrong,   from .  that 


\ 


.  THE    MORAL   OF    THIS    EXAMINATION.  315 

which  startled  the  House  of  Have  in  the  Roman 
world  by  its  proclamation  of  the  equal  fatherhood 
of  God  and  the  equal  brotherhood  of  men,  to  that 
which  in  our  own  time  broke  the  shackles  of  the 
chattel  slave.  But  it  is  well  to  recognize  it,  that 
those  who  would  know  the  truth  on  social  and 
economic  subjects  may  not  blindly  accept  what  at 
the  time  passes  for  authority,  but  may  think  for 
themselves. 

It  is  not,  however,  in  regard  to  social  problems 
only  that  I  trust  this  examination  may  do  something 
to  enforce  the  need  of  intellectual  self-reliance.  It 
is  in  regard  to  those  larger  and  deeper  problems  of 
man's  nature  and  destiny  which  are,  it  seems  to  me, 
closely  related  to  social  questions. 

Stepping  out  of  their  proper  sphere  and  arrogating 
to  themselves  an  authority  to  which  they  have  no 
claim,  professed  ceachers  of  spiritual  truths  long  pre- 
sumed to  deny  the  truths  of  the  natural  sciences. 
But  now  professed  teachers  of  the  natural  sciences, 
stepping  in  turn  out  of  their  proper  sphere  and  arro- 
gating to  themselves  an  authority  to  which  thei/  have 
no  claim,  presume  to  deny  spiuitual  truths.  And 
there  are  many,  who  having  discarded  an  authority 
often  perverted  by  the  influence  of  dominant  wrong, 
have  in  its  place  accepted  another  authorit}^  which  in 
its  blank  materialism  affords  as  efficient  a  means  for 
stilling  conscience  and  defending  selfish  greed  as  any 
perversion  of  religious  truth. 

Mr.  Spencer  is  the  foremost  representative  of  this 
authority.  Widely  regarded  as  the  scientific  philoso- 
pher ;  eulogized  by  his  admirers  as  the  greatest  of  all 


316  CONCLUSION. 

philosophers  —  as  the  man  who  has  cleared  and  illumi- 
nated the  field  of  philosophy  by  bringing  into  it  the 
exact  methods  of  science  —  he  carries  to  the  common 
mind  the  weight  of  the  marvellous  scientific  achieve- 
ments of  our  time  as  applied  to  the  most  moment- 
ous of  problems.  The  effect  is  to  imjDress  it  with  a 
vague  belief  that  modern  science  has  proved  the  idea 
of  God  to  be  an  ignorant  superstition  and  the  hope  of 
a  future  life  a  vain  delusion. 

Now,  the  great  respect  which  in  our  day  has 
attached  to  professed  scientific  teachers,  and  which 
has  in  large  degree  given  to  them  the  same  influence 
that  once  attached  to  the  teachers  of  religion,  arises 
from  the  belief  in  the  truthfulness  of  science — from 
the  belief  that  in  the  pure,  clear  atmosphere  in  which 
its  votaries  are  supposed  to  dwell  they  are  exempt 
from  temptations  to  pervert  and  distort.  And  this 
has  been  largely  attributed  to  them  where  they  have 
passed  the  boundaries  of  what  is  properly  the  domain 
of  the  natural  sciences  and  assumed  the  teaching  of 
politics  and  religion.  It  is  his  reputation  as  an  hon- 
est, fearless  thinker,  bent  only  on  discovering  and 
proclaiming  the  truth,  a  reputation  which  he  derives 
from  his  reputation  as  a  scientific  philosopher,  tliat 
gives  to  Mr.  Spencer  the  powerful  influence  wdiich, 
having  been  exerted  to  deny  all  hope  of  a  world  to 
come,  is  now  exerted  to  deny  the  right  of  the  masses 
to  the  essentials  of  life  in  this  world  —  to  maintain 
the  wrong,  wider  than  that  of  chattel  slavery,  which 
condemns  so  many  not  merely  to  physical,  but  to 
mental  and  moral  privation  and  want,  to  undeveloped 
and  distorted  lives  and  to  untimely  death. 

While  the  examination  we  have   made  has   only 


.THE   MORAL   OP   THIS    EXAMINATION.  317 

incidentally  touched  the  larger  phases  of  Mr.  Spencer's 
philosophy,  it  has  afforded  an  opportunity  to  judge 
of  the  veiy  things  on  which  his  popular  reputation 
is  based  —  his  intellectual  honesty  and  his  capacity 
for  careful,  logical  reasoning.  It  has,  so  to  speak, 
brought  the  alleged  pliilosopher  out  of  what  to  the 
ordinary  man  is  a  jungle  of  sounding  phrases  and  big 
words,  and  placed  him  on  open  ground  wdiere  he  may 
be  easily  understood  and  measured.  In  his  first  book, 
written  when  he  believed  in  God,  in  a  divine  order, 
in  a  moral  sense,  and  which  he  has  now  emasculated, 
he  does  apjjear  as  an  honest  and  fearless,  though  some- 
what too  careless  a  thinker.  But  that  part  of  our 
examination  which  crosses  what  is  now  his  distinct- 
ive philosophy  shows  him  to  be,  as  a  philosopher 
ridiculous,  as  a  man  contemptible  —  a  fawning  Vicar 
of  Bray,  clothing  in  pompous  phraseology  and  arro- 
gant assumption  logical  confusions  so  absurd  as  to 
be  comical. 

If  the  result  be  to  shatter  an  idol,  I  trust  it  may 
also  be  to  promote  freedom  of  thought. 

As  there  are  many  to  whom  the  beauty  and  har- 
mony of  economic  laws  are  hidden,  and  to  whom 
the  inspiring  thought  of  a  social  order  in  which 
there  should  be  work  for  all,  leisure  for  all,  and 
abundance  for  all  —  in  which  all  miofht  be  at  least 
as  true,  as  generous  and  as  manful  as  they  wish  to 
be  —  is  shut  out  by  the  deference  paid  to  economic 
authorities  who  have  as  it  were  given  bonds  not 
to  find  that  for  which  they  profess  to  seek,  so 
there  are  many  to-day  to  whom  any  belief  in  the 
spiritual  element,  in  the  existence  of  God  and  in  a 
future  life,  is  darkened  or  destroyed,  not  so  much  by 


318  CONCLUSION. 

difficulties  they  themselves  find,  but  by  what  they 
take  to  be  the  teachings  of  science.  Conscious  of 
their  own  ignorance,  distrustful  of  their  own  powers, 
stumbling  over  scientific  technicalities  and  awed  by 
metaphysical  terminology,  they  are  disposed  to  accept 
on  faith  the  teachings  of  such  a  man  as  Mr.  Spencer, 
as  those  of  one  who  on  all  things  knows  more  and 
sees  further  than  they  can,  and  to  accord  to  what 
they  take  to  be  intellectual  pre-eminence  the  moral 
pre-eminence  that  they  feel  ought  to  accompany  it. 
I  know  the  feeling  of  such  men,  for  I  remember  the 
years  when  it  was  my  own. 

To  these  it  is  my  hope  that  this  examination  may 
be  useful,  by  putting  them  on  inquiry.  In  its  course 
we  have  tested,  in  matters  where  ordinary  intelligence 
and  knowledge  are  competent  to  judge,  the  logical 
methods  and  intellectual  honesty  of  the  foremost  of 
those  who  in  the  name  of  science  eliminate  God  and ' 
degrade  man,  taking  from  human  life  its  highest  dig- 
nity and  deepest  hope.  Now,  if  in  simple  matters 
we  find  such  confusion,  such  credulity,  such  violation 
of  every  canon  of  sound  reasoning  as  we  have  found 
here,  shall  we  blindly  trust  in  deeper  matters  —  in 
those  matters  which  always  have  and  always  must 
perplex  the  intellect  of  man  ? 

Let  us  rather,  as  I  said  in  the  beginning,  not  too 
much  underrate  our  own  powers  in  what  is  concerned 
with  common  facts  and  general  relations.  While  we 
may  not  be  scientists  or  philosophers  we  too  are  men. 
And  as  to  things  which  the  telescope  cannot  resolve, 
nor  the  microscope  reveal,  nor  the  spectrum  analysis 
throw  light  nor  the  tests  of  the  chemist  discover,  it 
is  as  irrational  to  blindly  accept  the  dictum  of  those 


THE    MORAL   OF   THIS    EXAMINATION.  819 

who  say,  "Thus  saith  science!"  as  it  is  in  things 
that  are  the  proper  field  of  the  natural  sciences  to 
bow  before  the  dictum  of  those  wlio  say,  "Thus 
saitli  religion !" 

I  care  nothing  for  creeds.  I  am  not  concerned 
with  any  one's  religious  belief.  But  I  would  have 
men  think  for  themselves.  If  we  do  not,  we  can  only 
abandon  one  superstition  to  take  up  another,  and  it 
may  be  a  worse  one.  It  is  as  bad  for  a  man  to  think 
that  he  can  know  nothing  as  to  think  he  knows  all. 
There  are  things  which  it  is  given  to  all  possessing 
reason  to  know,  if  they  will  but  use  that  reason. 
And  some  things  it  may  be  there  are,  that  — as  was 
said  by  one  whom  the  learning  of  the  time  sneered 
at,  and  the  high  priests  persecuted,  and  polite  society, 
speaking  through  the  voice  of  those  who  knew  not 
what  they  did,  crucified  —  are  hidden  from  the  wise 
and  prudent  and  revealed  unto  babes. 

New  York,  October  12,  1892. 


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"  '  The  Master  of  Silence '  is  the  first  novel  of  Mr.  Irving 
Bacheller,  of  the  newspaper  syndicate,  and  deals  in  a  striking 
way  with  the  faculty  of  mind-reading."— A'eiv  York  World. 


Charles  L.  Webster  <s'  Co. 

"  A  well-named  story  is  already  on  the  road  to  success 
Altoeether  the  story  is  a  strange  character  study,  tull 
of  suggestion,  earnest  in  moral  purpose,  and  worthy  ot  &\X.y:xi- 
t\c,n ''—Cincinnati  Enquirer. 

'\.  There  is  no  let  up  in  the  intrigue  of  The  Master  of  bilence, 
and  there  is  plot  and  action  enough  in  it  to  construct  a  book- 
case full  of  novels  by  Howells  &  J&mesr-Cambridge  Tribune. 

Mr  Billy  Downs  and  His  Likes.— By  Richard  Mal- 
colm Johnston,  author  of  "  Dukcsborough  Tales. 
Colouel  Johnston  has  selected  a  number  of  his  most 
characteristic  and  entertaining  stories,  now  firet  pub- 
lished in  book  form,  for  a  volume  of  the  new  "t  iction, 
Fact  and  Fancy  Series."  Colonel  Johnston  is  easily 
the  dean  of  Southern  men  of  letters,  and  the  announce- 
ment of  a  new  volume  from  his  pen  calls  for  no  further 
comment.     Cloth,  12mo,  75  cents. 

Moonblight  and  Six  Feet  of  Romance.— By  Dan 
Be  ^rd.  In  ' '  Mooubliiiht  "  the  artist-author  has  brought 
into  play  all  those  resources  of  humor,  imagination, 
and  sarcasm  for  which  he  is  so  well  known,  to  teach 
under  the  guise  of  a  romance  the  lesson  of  the  wrongs 
inflicted  by  capital  on  labor.  In  the  light  of  recent 
events  at  the  Homestead  mills,  this  book  seems  to  have 
been  prophetic.  Illustrated  by  the  author.  Cloth,  8vo, 
$1.00. 

"  \  strant'e  but  powerful  hook.''— Philadelphia  BvMetin. 
"  He  does  not  construct  a  Utopia  like  Bellamy;  the  reforms 
he  proposes  are  sensible  and  would  be  profitable,  if  greedy 
capital  could  be  induced  to  consider  and  try  them."— Spri?ij/- 
aeld  Republican.  „,..,,,.  j 

"  It  is  a  witty,  gay,  poetical  book,  full  of  bright  things  and 
true  things,  the  seer  donning  a  jester's  garb  to  preach  in;  and 
one  may  be  sure,  under  the  shrug  and  the  smile,  of  the  keen 
dart  aimed  at  pride,  prejudice,  self-seeking,  injustice  and  the 
praise  for  whatsoever  is  beautiful  and  good.  —  Hartfora 
Courant. 

The  Prinee  and  the  Pauper.  A  Tale  for  Young 
People  of  all  Ages.— By  :\Iark  Twain.  New  popu- 
lar edition  of  this  "classic "  of  American  fiction.  It  is 
a  charming  romance  of  the  life  and  times  of  Edward 
VI.,  the  boy  king  of  England,  and  is  considered  by 
many  to  be  "Mark  Twain's  best  work.  Pronounced  by 
hi  o-h  authorities  one  of  the  best  child's  stories  ever  writ- 
ten Uniform  with  the  cheap  edirion  of  "Huckleberry 
Finn."     Illustrated.     Cloth,  13mo,  $1.00. 


Popular  New  Books. 

Adventures  of  Huckleberry  Finn.  (Tom  Saw- 
yer's Comrade.)— By  Mark  Twain.  New  cheap 
edition  of  the  laughable  adveutures  of  Huck  Finn  and 
a  runaway  slave  in  a  raft  journey  along  the  Mississippi. 
Contains  the  famous  description  of  a  Southern  feud. 
Illustrated  by  E.  W.  Kemble.     Cloth,  12mo,  fl.OO. 

Ivan  the  Fool,  and  Other  Stories.— By  Leo  Tolstoi. 

Translated  direct  from  the  Russian  by  Count  Norraikow, 
witli  illustrations  by  the  celebrated  Russian  artist, 
Gribayedoff.     Cloth,  13mo,  $1.00. 

"  The  stories  in  this  volume  are  wonderfully  simple  and 
pure." — Detroit  Free  Press. 

"As  creations  of  fancy  they  take  high  rank."  —  Boston 
Transcript. 

"  '  Ivan  the  Fool '  is  one  of  the  most  interesting  and  sugges- 
tive of  Tolstoi's  fables,  and  the  work  of  translation  is  admir- 
ably performed."— CTiicago  Standard. 

Life  IS  Worth  Living,  and  Other  Stories.— By  Leo 

Tolstoi.  Translated  direct  from  the  Russian  by  Coun*^ 
Norraikow.  This  work,  imlike  some  of  his  later  writ- 
ings, .shows  the  great  writer  at  his  best.  The  stories, 
while  entertaining  in  themselves,  are  written  for  a  pur- 
pose, and  contain  abundant  foocl  for  reflection.  Illus- 
trated.    Cloth,  13mo,  $1.00. 

Merry  Tales,— By  Mark  Twain.  The  opening  volume  of 
the  new  "Fiction,  Fact,  and  Fancy  Series."  Contains 
some  of  the  author's  favorite  sketches,  including  his 
personal  reminiscences  of  the  war  as  given  in  ' '  The 
Private  History  of  a  Campaign  that  Failed."  Cloth, 
12mo,  75  cents. 

"Very  readable  and  amusing  tales  they  are." — Nexv  York 
Sun. 

"  Thousands  will  welcome  in  permanent  form  these  delicious 
bits  of  humor." — Boston  Traveller. 

"  These  tales  are  now  brought  together  in  an  attractive  and 
convenient  volume  which  all  those  who  enjoy  the  author's  in- 
imitable humor  will  appreciate." — Public  Opinion. 

"Some  of  these  stories  are  deep  with  pathos;  others  bubble 
over  with  humor.  All  of  them  are  intensely  interesting  and 
readable  from  the  opening  sentence  to  the  closing  line." — New 
Orleans  States. 


Charles  L.  Webster  6^  Co. 


Poetry. 

Selected  Poems  by  Walt  Whitman.— Chosen  and 
edited  by  Arthur  Stedman.  Shortly  before  Mr.  Whit- 
man's death,  tlie  old  poet  for  the  first  time  consented  to 
the  publication  of  a  selection  from  "Leaves  of  Grass," 
embracing  his  most  popular  short  poems  and  representa- 
tive passages  from  his  longer  lyrical  efforts.  Arranged 
for  home  and  school  use.  With  a  portrait  of  the  au- 
thor. ("Fiction,  Fact,  and  Fancy  Series.")  Cloth, 
12mo,  75  cents. 

"  Blr.  Stedman's  choice  is  skilfully  made."— 37ie  Nation. 

"  The  volume  i-epresents  all  that  is  best  in  Walt  Whitman." 
— San  Francisco  Chronicle. 

"  That  in  Walt  Whitman  which  is  virile  and  bardic,  lyrically 
fresh  and  sweet,  or  epically  grand  and  elemental,  will  be  pre- 
served to  the  edification  of  young  men  and  maidens,  as  well  as 
of  maturer  folk." — Hartford  Courant. 

"  The  intention  of  the  editor  has  been  to  offer  those  of  AVhit- 
man's  poems  which  are  most  truly  representative  of  his  genius. 
The  selections  have  been  well  made,  and  those  who  have  yet 
to  make  acquaintance  with  this  most  original  of  American 
poets  will  have  reason  to  thank  the  publishers  for  this  little 
volume." — Boston  Transcript. 

Flower  o'  the  Vine:  Romantic  Ballads  and  Sos- 
piri  di  Roma. — By  William  Sharp,  author  of  "A 
Fellows  and  His  Wife"  (with  Mi.ss  Howard),  "Life 
and  Letters  of  Joseph  Severn,"  etc.  With  an  introduc- 
tion by  Thomas  A.  Janvier,  and  a  portrait  of  the  .author. 
As  one  of  the  most  popular  of  the  younger  English 
poets,  equal  success  is  anticipated  for  this  first  American 
edition  of  Mr.  Sharp's  poems.  Its  welcome  in  the 
American  press  has  been  most  hearty.  Tastefully 
bound,  with  appropriate  decorative  design.  Cloth, 
8vo,  $1.50. 

"This  volume  of  verse,  by  Mr.  William  Sharp,  has  a  music 
like  that  of  the  meeting  of  two  winds,  one  blown  down  from 
the  Northern  seas,  keen  and  salty,  the  other  carrying  on  its 
wings  the  warm  fragrance  of  Southern  fields."— T/ie  Literary 
World. 

"  These  old  ballads,  whether  in  Scottish  dialect  or  not,  are 
transfused  with  the  wild,  uncanny,  shivering  character  of  all 
the  old  myths  of  tlie  North,  a  .strange  piiugent  chill,  so  to 
speak,  as  if  the  breath  that  gave  them  voice  were  blown  across 
leagues  of  iceberg  and  glacier." — Chicago  Times. 

"  When  Mr.  Sharp  leaves  the  North  with  its  wild  .stories  of 
love  and  fighting  and  death,  and  carries  us  away  with  him  in 


Popular  New  Books. 

the  '  Sospiri  di  Roma '  to  the  warmth  and  the  splendor  of  the 
South,  he  equally  shows  the  creative  faculty.  He  is  a  true 
lover  of  Earth  with  her  soothing  touch  and  soft  caress;  he  lies 
in  her  arms,  he  hears  her  whispered  secret,  and  through  the 
real  discovers  the  spiritual."' — Philadelphia  Record. 

"  The  poems  combine  a  gracefulness  of  rhythm  and  a  subtle 
sweetness." — Baltimore  American. 

Travel,  Biography,  and  Essays. 

The  German  Emperor  and  His  Eastern  Neighi- 
bors. — By  Por ltne y  Bigelow.  Cable  despatches  slate 
that.  Mr.  Bigelow  has  been  expelled  fi'om  Russia  for 
writing  this  volume.  Interesting  personal  notes  of  his 
old  playmate's  boyhood  and  education  are  given,  to- 
gether with  a  description  of  the  Emperor's  army,  his 
course  and  policy  since  accession,  and  the  condition  of 
affairs  on  the  Russian  and  Roumanian  frontiers.  "With 
fine  portrait  of  William  II.  ("  Fiction,  Fact,  and  Fancy 
Series.")     Cloth,  12mo,  75  cents. 

"  A  book  to  attract  immediate  and  close  attention." — 
Chicago  Times. 

"  An  interesting  contribution  to  evidence  concerning  Russia." 
— Springfield  Repiuhlican. 

"  A  much-needed  correction  to  the  avalanche  of  abuse 
heaped  upon  the  German  Emperor." — Philadelphia  Inquirer. 

"The  book  should  have  a  place  in  the  librarj-  of  everj'  stu- 
dent of  politics." — Boston  Pilot. 

Paddles  and  Politics  Down  the  Danube.  —  By 

PouLTNEY  BiGELOw.  Companion  volume  to  "  The  Ger- 
man Emperor. "  A  highly  interesting  journal  of  a  canoe- 
voyage  down  "the  Mississippi  of  Europe"  from  its 
sotirce  to  the  Black  Sea,  with  descriptions  of  the  resi- 
dent nations,  and  casual  discussions  of  the  political 
situation.  Illustrated  with  numerous  offhand  sketches 
made  on  the  spot  by  Mr.  Bigelow.  ("Fiction,  Fact, 
and  Fancy  Series.")    Cloth,  12mo,  75  cents. 

Writings  of  Christopher  Columbus.  —Edited,  with 
an  introduction,  by  Paul  Leicester  Ford.  Mr.  Ford 
has  for  the  first  time  collected  in  one  handy  volume 
translations  of  those  letters,  etc.,  of  Columbus  which 
describe  his  experiences  in  the  discovery  and  occupation 
of  the  New  World.  With  frontispiece  Portrait.  ( ' '  Fic- 
tion, Fact,  and  Fancy  Series.")     Cloth,  12mo,  75  cents. 


Charles  L.   Webster  <s^  Co. 

Under  Summer  Skies. — By  Clintox  Scollard.  A 
poefs  itiuerarv.  Professor  Scollard  relates,  iu  his  cliann- 
iug  literary  style,  the  episodes  of  a  rambling  tour 
through  Egypt,  Palestine,  Italy,  and  the  Alps.  The 
text  is  interspersed  with  poetical  interludes,  sugge.sted 
by  passing  events  and  scenes.  Coming  nearer  home, 
visits  to  Arizona  and  the  Bermudas  are  described  iu 
separate  chapters.  Tiie  volume  is  attractively  illus- 
trated by  INIargaret  Landers  Randolph,  and  is  most  suit- 
able as  a  traveling  companion  or  as  a  picture  of  lauds 
beyond  the  reach  of  the  reader.  Cloth,  8vo,  fl.OO. 
(Iu  Preparation.) 

Autobiographia. — By  Walt  Whitman.  Edited  by 
Arthur  Stedman.  The  story  of  Whitman's  life,  told  in 
his  own  words.  These  selected  passages  from  Whit- 
man's prose  works,  chosen  witli  his  approbation,  are  so 
arranged  as  to  give  a  consecutive  account  of  the  old 
poet's  career  in  his  own  picturesque  language.  Uniform 
with  the  new  edition  of  Walt  Whitman's  "Selected 
Poems."  ("Fiction,  Fact,  and  Fancy  Series.")  Cloth, 
12mo,  75  cents. 

Life  of  Jane  Welsh  Carlyle. — By  Mrs.  Alexander 
Ireland.  A  rema_Kable  biography  of  a  wonderful 
woman,  written  and  compiled  by  one  in  thorough  sym- 
pathy with  her  subject,  from  material  made  public  for 
the  first  time.  The  powerful  side-light  it  throws  iipon 
the  life  and  character  of  Thomas  Carlyle  will  make  the 
volume  indispensable  to  all  who  venerate  the  genius,  or 
are  interested  in  the  personality,  of  the  Sage  of  Chelsea. 
Vellum,  cloth  (half  bound),  8vo,  $1.75. 

Essays  in  Miniature. — By  Agnes  Repplier,  author 
of  "Points  of  View,"  etc.  A  new  volume  of  this 
brilliant  essayist's  writings,  in  which  she  discourses 
wittily  and  wisely  on  a  number  of  pertinent  topics.  No 
new  essayist  of  recent  years  has  been  received  with  such 
hearty  commendation  in  this  country  or  England. 
("Fiction,  Fact,  and  Fancy  Series.")  Cloth,  13mo,  75 
cents.     (In  Press.) 


Popular  JVeic  Books.      Chas.  L.  Webster  c^  Co. 

riiscellaneous. 

Tariff  Reform:  The  Paramount  Issue.— Speeches 
and  writings  on  the  questions  involved  in  the  presiden- 
tial contest  of  1893.  By  William  M.  Springer,  Chair- 
man of  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means  of  the  House 
of  Representatives,  Fifty-second  Congress.  With  por- 
traits of  the  author  and  others.  This  book  is  endorsed 
by  Hon.  Adlai  E.  Stevenson,  Hon.  Calvin  S.  Brice,  and 
Hon.  John  G.  Carlisle.  Unquestionably  the  paramount 
issue  of  the  Campaign  is  the  Tariff.  Cloth,  library 
style,  $1.50;  Paper,  $1.00. 

Physical  Beauty:  How  to  Obtain  and  How  to 
Preserve  It. — By  Annie  Jenness  Miller.  A  prac- 
tical, sensil)le,  helpful  book  that  every  woman  should 
read;  including  chapters  on  Hygiene,  Foods,  Sleep, 
Bodily  Expression,  the  Skin,  the  Eyes,  the  Teeth,  the 
Hair,  Dress,  the  Cultivation  of  Individuality,  etc.,  etc. 
Fully  illustrated,  octavo,  300  pages.  White  Vellum, 
Gold  and  Silver  Stamps,  in  Box,  $2.00;  Blue  Vellum, 
$3.00. 

"  Every  woman  will  be  a  more  perfect  woman  for  reading  it; 
more  perfect  in  soul  and  hody."  —Philadelphia  Inquirer. 

"  Her  arg-uments  are  sane,  philosophical,  and  practical." — 
New  York  World. 

"  Parents  may  well  place  it  in  the  hands  of  their  young 
daughters." — Cincinnati  Commercial-Gazette. 

"Earnestly  and  gracefully  written." — New  York  Sun. 

"  The  illustrations  are  pretty  and  suggestive."— T7ie  Critic. 

The  Speech  of  Monkeys.— By  R.  L.  Garner.  Mr. 
Garner's  articles,  published  in  the  leading  periodicals 
and  journals  touching  upon  this  subject,  have  been 
widely  read  and  favorably  commented  upon  by  scientific 
men  both  here  and  abroad.  "The  Speech  of  Monkeys " 
embodies  his  researches  up  to  the  present  time.  It  is 
divided  into  two  parts,  the  first  being  a  record  of  ex- 
periments with  monkeys  and  other  animals,  and  the 
second  part  a  treatise  on  the  theory  of  speech.  The 
work  is  written  so  as  to  bring  the  subject  within  reach 
of  the  casual  reader  without  impairing  its  scientific 
value.     Small  8vo,  with  Frontispiece,  Cloth,  $1.00. 


i 


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